


The Darkest Prize

by HeironymousPosh



Category: Darkest Dungeon (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Occult, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), The Hamlet, Violence, Weald, and a HEIRESS, let's get Eldritch-y
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-18
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-03-06 07:49:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 33,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13406733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeironymousPosh/pseuds/HeironymousPosh
Summary: A man on the side of the road, bloody and barely conscious. A hamlet that has seen better days. A woman with nothing to lose, and everything to gain.The bounty hunter seeks only one thing: his prize. And he will find it here, in a land cloaked in shadow, but it will not come to him without a struggle. There is no turning back now, either; it is time to collect. Part 1 of a Series.





	1. Alasdair

“By the Light, he lives!”

“Wait, he’s alive?”

Words, distant, but belonging to two very distinct voices. He couldn’t see anything; well, only because he had not yet opened his eyes. But he could hear, and feel. And oh, fuck, did he _feel._ He felt a lot of things, a bit of remorse and a hint of confusion, but mostly pain. Little lances up and down his legs, a burning feeling in the lower right corner of his abdomen, and smaller pains throughout the rest of his body.

 _You’ve been shot, probably._ That was what it felt like. In fact, if he moved in just the right way, he could feel the musket ball an inch or two above his pelvis, embedded in muscle.

 _Yeah, you’ve been shot_.

“He’s still breathing! Quit searching his luggage and help me!” the first voice yelled, surprisingly urgent.

“Hey, if he dies before we get him back-”

“He won’t die,” the first voice said, and he could hear footsteps approaching him. He could feel someone’s breath, hot and rank with the scent of meat, but strangely comforting.

“We’re not gonna let you die,” the first voice said, and he opened his eyes just enough to see a friendly smile looking down on him. Then he blacked out once more.

 

* * *

 

“He’s awake.”

Another voice, now.

_How much time passed then? I’m not dead, I suppose. That’s a relief._

He opened his eyes now, and the pain was excruciating, but it felt like a cleaner pain. He could feel bandages wrapped over his skin in several places, and could smell a harsh, minty ointment. It stung his nostrils but it was comforting, in an odd way. And a woman, her face except for her eyes veiled by thick blue cloth, stood over him. Another stood behind her, cleaning a few unnerving-looking surgical tools.

“You feel good?” the nearest woman spoke.

“Neither good, nor bad,” he replied brusquely, his mouth as dry as bramble. “Water.”

The woman handed him a leather flask full of water, and he drank almost the entire thing, managing to choke it down without sitting up.

“You lost a lot of blood on the road,” the woman said after he returned the flask to her. “If not for the crusader-”

“Where am I?”

The woman did not take kindly to being interrupted, judging by how her eyebrows became quickly furrowed, but she responded anyway.

“This is a hospice. You’re in a village, by the name of Tauros. Does that sound familiar?”

_Yes, in fact, it does._

“Yes. I was supposed to come here,” he replied, his mouth still dry in spite of the water.

“Well, you made it. Almost didn’t,” she said.

“You didn’t save me on that damn road,” he said. “Who did?”

“The crusader and his sneak thief partner,” she replied. “Their names, I do not know.”

“Huh. Well.”

That was about all he could say, or wanted to rather. His head ached, his wound still throbbed despite being sealed and cleaned, and his mouth was too dry to talk any more. The woman left with her partner, promising to bring back more water, and he was left alone in the dim chamber, feeling like a prisoner.

 

* * *

 

Sleep came reluctantly, borne in on the backs of nightmares. Dreams of a dark forest, rank with corruption, occupied his uneasy mind as he slept off a burning fever. The trees around him, their boughs sagging with sickly vines and their bark rotting from blight, concealed horrors his own waking conscience could hardly conceive of. Several times in the night he awoke to moonlight streaming in from a dirty, smudged window. He turned to the moon and gasped and coughed, but fell asleep once more, the fever dreams returning like the eager lover he had never been able to experience.

 

* * *

 

Morning brought light, as well as food and water. He had slept little but was quite thankful that, at the very least, he was still alive.

“Your fever is better, but I will bring some herbs regardless,” the woman from yesterday told him, after a brief examination.

“Water, please,” he asked, his voice hoarse from the restless sleep. The woman gave him a flask but forced him to sit upright this time, no easy task thanks to the pounding headache and throbbing pain in his abdomen. But he did so, and was rewarded with a simple meal of bread, cheese, and a slice of sweet fig.

“You should be up and walking in a few days,” she told him as she prepared to depart. “I will check in on you in a few-”

“Wait,” he said, and she stopped in her tracks and turned back to him.

“The night,” he said. “Is it always so dark?”

She hesitated a moment.

“This is a dark place.”

 

* * *

 

Two days of monotony and wordless suffering passed before his fever eased, the pain subsided to a dull sensation, and he regained a full appetite. On the first day he exited the bed and put pants on, he was informed that it was a Wednesday, at ten o’clock in the morning, and that he had a person of interest desiring to see him.

“I already have a person of interest I wish to see,” he informed the nurse, but she would have none of it. She insisted thoroughly that he was to see an “Emilia Lancette”, and deliver himself to her the next day once he had been checked out by the chirurgeons. Under threat of force he returned to his bedchamber, and stared out of the window at the vast expanse of terrain presented before him. Past rooftops and poorly-constructed houses, beyond a crumbling abbey and an open graveyard, he could see a moor rising in the distance, grand and menacing. It rose high into the air, its craggy cliffs imposing and its height decorated with what appeared to be stonework. Beyond it, great mountains surged into the sky, their peaks capped with thick, brooding clouds. And the sun, as though veiled in mourning, was darker than it ought to be.

 

* * *

 

Thursday, at one o’clock in the afternoon, he was a free man. He was able to stumble out of the hospice, fully clothed and delivered from his feverish prison, and enter the town of Tauros proper. Never before had he seen such ramshackle buildings or such destitution, even though he was no stranger to poverty. Men and women, their faces gaunt and their countenances veiled by ragged cloth hoods and felt caps, passed him but said no word to him. He was a stranger, but nobody dared to speak to him, for fear of perhaps picking up some eldritch hex that would damn them to an eternity of suffering. And so, feeling bedraggled and a little concerned, he stumbled down the cobblestones to the only building that appeared to be in good condition, an impressive-looking motte in the center of town.

At the gate to the compound, he was stopped by a sentry overhead, a man dressed in loose-fitting chainmail and carrying only a spear and battered kite shield for protection. He remained before the gatehouse until a few surly-looking men approached him and escorted him inside.

“You stay with us or we’ll beat you bloody,” they warned, but he had no intention of running as they led him into the keep and up a flight of stairs into an open common room, where a sad scene presented itself. A long wooden table was set in the middle of the room, flanked by benches and shredded tapestries hanging on the walls. Only a few of the sconces were lit; the massive windows on the right side of the room admitted some light, but it was dirty light, filtered through scum and years’ worth of crusted filth. And at the very back of the room was a small table, a rickety-looking chair, and an impossibility.

_A clean woman?_

At least she appeared to be clean. As he approached the woman whom he assumed was Emilia Lancette, he could tell she was well-dressed, and bore all the quirks of nobility. She wore a well-knit crimson shawl around her neck, her hair neatly tied behind her head in an organized bun. She even smiled as she saw him approach, and set down her quill and set her writing aside as she greeted him.

“Alasdair Macdougall, I presume?”

“That would be me,” replied Alasdair.

“I was informed of your name when I read this,” she said, withdrawing a slip of paper from a nearby pile and holding it out in front of him. It was too far away to read, but Alasdair immediately knew what it was. His heart skipped a beat.

“That’s mine,” he said, feeling his fingers begin to tingle and a cold sweat form on his brow.

“I’m aware. It has your name on it,” she said. “As well as another’s...is this why you came here? Bounty hunter?”

“I did.” He had nothing to hide, nor any shame to feel about it. A bounty hunter hunted, that’s how he made his living.

“You seem alarmed,” Emilia said.

“That’s my paper,” he replied.

“I will hand it back to you,” she promised. “I am just curious about your motives. I always am.”

“I am here to collect. Do you know the man I seek?”

“He has been a thorn in this town’s side for some time, long before I arrived,” she said, bidding him to approach as she extended the letter. Alasdair quickly snatched it up and then retreated a couple of steps, keenly aware that the sentries behind him were watching his every move closely.

“Esteban is the only name we know him by, and though his past remains a mystery, his present occupation is very clearly a threat to this hamlet,” Emilia explained. “I’m sure you’re well aware.”

“I read my bounties,” Alasdair said.

“A smart man.”

“Yes, I have come for him, and him alone,” Alasdair continued, growing impatient. “So why am I here?”

Emilia paused a moment, and shuffled a little, as though she was considering the best way to answer his question.

“Do you know who I am?”

“Emilia Lancette, I presume,” Alasdair said.

She chuckled, and lit a bright little smile that appeared surprisingly genuine.

“Well, Baroness Emilia Lancette. But I’ll give you credit for what you know.”

She paused, as if expecting a response. Alasdair did nothing.

“I’m a noble-”

“I know. I know what a baroness is.”

One of the guards muttered something under his breath, but she did not appear taken aback. Rather, she looked intrigued.

“Do you know the history of this place, Alasdair?”

 _First name basis, huh? I didn’t know we were that friendly._ He replied negatively and waited for an explanation. It did not come, not what he was expecting at least.

“The Lancette family once ruled these lands. But my ancestors brought nothing but darkness to this place. They defiled it and in the process defiled their name,” she said. “I am the last legitimate Lancette heir. And I have come to reclaim my birthright.”

She sat back in her chair as if waiting for his reply to such a bold statement.

“You have come to reclaim,” he said, feeling sweat on his brow again. “And I have come to collect.”

“And I believe we can help each other out,” Emilia told him.

“Is that so-”

“This land is dark, Alasdair Macdougall,” she said. “Have you seen it? Felt it?”

He said nothing, but yes. _I have seen it. In my dreams. Felt it, in my restless sleep. The moon, and the sun...as if veiled, they shine dimly here._

“You can feel it here, the darkness my ancestors beckoned into this land. I do not intend to let this state of affairs continue,” Emilia said.

“I can admire that,” Alasdair said. “But, now how do I fit into your scheme?”

She motioned to the bounty papers he still held in his hand, a little crumpled after the long ride down the Old Road.

“With that.”

“With this?”

“You will pursue the bounties of wicked men and creatures alike,” she said. “Every one of them that you kill is a boon to this hamlet and this cursed loam.”

_Well, when you put it that way…_

Alasdair had no grand intentions or designs for his life. He wanted money. Money paid for food, for bedding and comfort, for wine and women and the dice he had a penchant for...but there was something undeniably powerful about taking sides with this strange Lancette, and serving her purposes just as well as his.

“I suppose I have no choice but to say yes?” he said, glancing down at the papers again.

“You have a choice,” she informed him. “But choose wisely.”

_I have nothing to lose. I have so much to gain._

“I’m in.”


	2. The First Line

Alasdair was given decent housing, in a barracks cordon of the hamlet’s keep, and was provided with his baggage and the armor he had been wearing at the time of the ambush on the road. The scale mail was damaged but it was returned to him with a promise that the town’s blacksmith would patch it right up, as soon as he had completed his weekly binge of drinking at the bar. Whenever that would end up being.

_Until then, I have a musket-ball shaped hole in my cuirass. It’s a shame they didn’t give me back the musket ball._

His room was small but still cozy, complete with a straw bed, inventory space for his gear, and a little bookcase in the corner that contained a few aged tomes, all of them religious in nature. Still, it was comforting, to be somewhere that resembled home. It was better than most of the taverns he had slept in on his way to Tauros, and hey, it was fairly warm too all things considered.

_I can at least make it feel like home, maybe_.

He didn’t intend to be in Tauros too long, anyway. He had come here for one thing, and as soon as he found the man he was looking for he would be heading back to retrieve his bounty, and then he’d be set.

_Ten thousand gold pieces. A fortune, waiting to be spent._

The things he could do with that much money. Home had never held much promise for him, and there was nothing there left to invest in either. But the future was bright, and it gleamed like gold.

_It’s just a matter of finding the bastard._

And that would be the hard part. Killing Esteban, Alasdair assumed, would be fairly easy even if he struggled and fought hard. Dragging his corpse in or, hell, even cutting off his infamous half-moon birthmark and bringing it in, would be easy if not physically exhausting. _Finding_ him, though, in the woods around the hamlet? That would be the tough part.

_You’ve gotta start somewhere. Lancette might even be helpful, too; she wants him dead as much as you do._

A knock on his door distracted him from the thoughts compiling in his brain. Tightening the strands of his trousers, he rose and greeted the guest, who looked like he was ten years overdue for the grave.

“The Baroness requests your presence, sir,” his stooped old visitor informed him, handing him a letter sealed with wax and bearing the sigil of the Lancettes’ cursed noble house. “But she is occupied with the defenses of the hamlet until one o’clock, at which time she requires you up at the abbey.”

_Better be giving me something to do_ , he thought as he accepted the letter and bid the old man a good day. As he hobbled down the hall, Alasdair stood in his doorway and opened the letter, curious as to its contents. The missive was mercifully short.

 

_Alasdair,_

 

_We have work to do here. I have assignments to dole out. I have something for you, too. Meet me in the abbey at one o’clock and I will give you your orders. I will keep your own interests in mind for this._

_E. L._

 

He crumpled the letter up and stuffed it into his satchel, from which he grabbed his armor and weapons in anticipation.

_How kind of you to consider me_.

As he passed through the gatehouse, the guards above leered warily at him but said nothing. Even though they recognized him, they still seemed suspicious.

_Place like this gets to you, I suppose._ He paid them no heed, said nothing to them, and then proceeded out into town, aware that he had an hour or so to kill before his presence was required at the abbey. He figured it might be high time to check out the town, and see what he could see; after all, he might be here for a few weeks, at the very least.

_It hasn’t gotten any wealthier since the last time I looked_ , he thought, as he passed several ramshackle hovels on his way towards what he assumed was the town square. A few chickens scrambled away from him as he walked, and he saw one woman pumping water from a rickety well, but otherwise the town was abandoned.

_There’s more cheer in a graveyard._

The tavern, however, seemed well-lit and alive, at the very least. He could see smoke rising from its slightly damaged chimney, and could hear the sounds of conversation coming from within as he approached. Even if it were fairly quiet inside, he could at least get a drink and relax a little before having to talk to the Baroness again.

The interior of the tavern was dim but at least there were people. The bartender, a burly and muscular man with a shaved head and gnarly hands, was speaking to a couple of locals who seemed to be mostly preoccupied with their drinks. In one corner, two well-dressed and serious looking men sat at a table they occupied themselves, and he knew their eyes were upon him as he entered. Another table was occupied by a few conversing peasants but they sounded drunk and carefree, and he had no interest in speaking to them. He made a beeline for the bar.

“What’s your ale?”

“Ain’t got much,” the bartender replied. “It’s all wheat, though.”

“Give me something. Don’t care what,” Alasdair replied, waving him off. _I’m not picky._

“I would’ve suggested the Farmer’s Special, but it’s all good in a pinch,” someone to his right said. Alasdair turned to face her, and was surprised to see a fairly fresh-looking young woman, dressed up in a soldier’s overcoat and button-up trousers with a tricorn hat sitting neatly on her lap.

“You could’ve told me that five seconds ago,” Alasdair said.

“I could’ve,” she replied with a smirk. “But newcomers always have to make their own pick first.”

“I take it you’re not a newcomer, then?”

“Been here three weeks, thereabouts,” she said. “The name’s Cordelia.”

“Cordelia,” Alasdair repeated, as though thinking its meaning over in his head. “The name’s Alasdair.”

“You come from a distant place, perhaps?” she ventured.

“I’d rather not speak about background. What matters to me is the here and now,” Alasdair said, as the bartender returned with a mug of cool ale. He took a sip and, though the bitter taste did not please him well, it was far from the worst drink he had ever tried.

“And what brings you to the here and now, then?”

He hesitated, unsure of whether or not she could be trusted. Then he figured, what harm could it do if he told _half_ the truth?

“I’m a hunter.”

“A hunter of men, I assume,” Cordelia said.

“Yes.”

“Any particular man?”

And there, there was the dangerous question. Alasdair made certain to choose his next words carefully.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” he replied, grinning at her. She returned the smile, and to his surprise did not press the question further.

“Well, we all come here for something,” Cordelia continued, chuckling a bit. “Your motivation, I suppose, is money?”

“No other reason to hunt,” Alasdair said, shrugging.

“Some men hunt because they enjoy it,” she said.

“There’s enjoyment to it. But I don’t like the act of killing itself.”

“Well, that makes two of us,” Cordelia said, raising her mug. “Cheers?”

Alasdair returned the favor, and the two finished their drinks quickly, one after the other. Alasdair turned his attention to the strange men sitting in the corner. The one with slick black hair and a bandana wrapped around his neck was still watching him.

“Who are they?”

“Others. Like us, but different,” Cordelia said.

“Well, that was vague,” Alasdair said.

“One of them is a man of the faith. A sword of light. The other’s...more like you.”

“What does that mean?”

“A man of the street. He seeks the glint of gold,” Cordelia replied. Alasdair heard a chair scratch against the wooden floorboards of the bar and knew a visitor was coming. He signaled the bartender for another drink and waited as he heard footsteps approach him from behind.

“You’re new here. Can I get a name?”

Alasdair turned around to face the newcomer. It was not the black-haired man, in fact, but the other, a face that looked quite familiar.

“You were there on the Old Road the other day,” Alasdair said, recognizing the face.

“Oh, so you were conscious? I wasn’t so certain,” the stranger said, flashing a slight smile. “You would’ve been left for dead if my partner over there had his way.” Alasdair looked again at the man in the corner, who had not yet moved but was watching the scene unfold as he sipped from his mug.

“My name is Reynauld. And yours?”

“My name is Alasdair. I owe you a debt of gratitude, then, for what you did,” Alasdair said.

“You being here is enough,” Reynauld assured him.

“No, it’s-”

“No, your presence here more than makes up for it. You’ve joined our righteous fight here and for that I am grateful,” Reynauld said, waving his concerns away with a flick of his gloved hand. It was then that Alasdair noticed the necklace he bore, and the symbol upon it.

“You’re a man of the cloth?” Alasdair asked.

“Not quite,” Reynauld said. “I am neither a vestal nor a brown brother. I consider myself a crusader.”

“Yet still a man of the faith,” Alasdair said.

“Aye,” Reynauld said. “Not all of us here serve the light. But all of us here make up the first line of defense.”

“Against what?” Alasdair asked.

“Whatever might be out there on that moor.”

They shared a moment of silence, and Alasdair wondered what could possibly be out on those hallowed grounds that could give a crusader pause.

“Better drink up, lad,” the black-haired man cackled from his corner, finishing the rest of his ale and slamming the mug down on the table, as though celebrating some hard-earned victory.

“Don’t dissuade him, Dismas,” Reynauld warned, in the same way a disapproving father would chastise an ornery child.

“Yeah, well, there’s no way I could see the unseeable without a good drink,” Dismas grunted.

“I’m no stranger to horror,” Alasdair said.

“They all say that, Alasdair,” Reynauld said, with an unnerving grimace. “I have faith in your abilities, but you’d do well to prepare yourself.”

And with that he stood up and left, laying a few copper coins down on the bar’s facade. The bartender scooped them up in a hurry, and Alasdair quickly realized that the crusader had been generous enough to pay for his first drink.

“Don’t mind them too much,” Cordelia said, after Reynauld had re-joined his unbearably smug companion. “The highwayman in particular is a rude figure.”

“I’ve met people like him before. I’m no stranger,” Alasdair reassured her.

“Well, he won’t be the last,” Cordelia warned. “People don’t come here to live a happy life. Especially not people like Dismas.”

“I think I’ve noticed,” he replied, remembering the peasants he passed on his way to the tavern. They were anything but happy.

It was time for him to leave. He bid Cordelia farewell, even shaking her hand, and departed the tavern for the abbey on the hill, visible from every alley of the town due to its prominent precipice.

As he struggled up the rugged, unpaved road leading up to the abbey’s hillock, a light rain began to fall from the slate gray sky, not significant enough to soak him through but enough to give him annoyance. He passed a few idle townsfolk on the way up the hill; attending to their pitiful patches of root vegetables on the side of the road, they paid him no attention as he struggled up to the doors of the abbey.

He would have assumed the building abandoned if not for the woman standing outside one of its shattered windows, examining the damage and writing in what appeared to be a small notebook. He figured she was too busy with her work to notice him, but as he pulled at the cast iron handle of the massive wooden door she called him out.

“Abbey’s closed,” she barked, without even turning to glance at him.

“I was told to be here,” Alasdair responded.

“Oh.” She paused a moment, lowering her notebook, but she still did not look over at him. He could see her more clearly now and could tell that she was dressed in the brown, drab robes of one of the faithful - a vestal, by the looks of her.

“She’ll be waiting for you in the back, beyond the chancel,” she said, resuming her work. “Watch your step in there.”

_I’ll do my best, stranger_ , he thought, and pushed his way inside.

The interior of the chapel was about as dispiriting as the crumbling facade of the outside was. A massive, gaping aperture in the roof admitted rain and wind, and the floor was ruined beyond measure - grass and weeds poked their tentative heads through cracks in the stonework, and entire tiles had been removed, exposing the barren earth beneath. The pews were long gone, any interior woodwork had been removed years ago, and the smell of mildew hung in the air.

_How inspiring._ Alasdair began trooping towards the back of the church, and in short order found the occupants of the abbey - two well-armored guardsmen, spears in hand, standing outside of a dimly-lit room.

“I’ve been ordered here,” Alasdair informed them when they looked ready to challenge him.

“Name?”

“Macdougall. Alasdair,” he responded.

The first guard nodded at the second and they waved him into a small, stuffy room, where Emilia Lancette sat at a work desk, studying what appeared to be an aged blueprint of a structure long forgotten.

“I am glad you have some appetite for adventure,” Emilia greeted him as he took a seat in a rickety chair across from her.

“I always have, as long as there’s gold at the end of the trail,” Alasdair said.

“Well, lucky for you, the Lancette coffers run deep,” she said. “And I have a job for you.”

“If you recall-”

“I remember your bounty,” she said.

The paper was still in his pocket, securely clenched against his left thigh and covered by thick layers of leather and wool. He absentmindedly grasped at it, just to make sure it was still there.

“Recently one of the freeholders living on the northern edge of town reported that some of his neighbors have disappeared without a trace,” she explained, pulling a crumpled, slightly torn sheaf of paper out of her pile and unfolding it.

“Bandits?” Alasdair ventured. Brigands would commonly kidnap for a ransom, or even just for fun; money was beneficial, but what was life without a little bit of stick and poke?  

“Maybe bandits,” she mused. “But remember where in the world you are.”

_How could I forget?_

“I wouldn’t make any assumptions,” she continued when he did not speak. “Something has happened and some malevolent force is preying on our freeholders. This is a score that demands settling.”

“You can count me in, if the price is right,” he said.

“The price will be more than enough to suit you, I feel,” Emilia said.

“Give me the details,” he demanded.

She pulled out another sheaf and paper, this one more intact and marked with a wax seal of the crest of House Lancette. He read it over and took note of the very compelling monetary reward listed at the very end of the contract.

“The woods beyond this town are teeming with evil men and crawling horrors,” Emilia said. “One of those men may very well be the one you track.”

“Perhaps he is responsible for this very same act?” he wondered aloud.

“Who can tell?” Emilia said, with a smirk. She was trying to entice him but to be quite honest, the promised reward enticed him more than any human expression could.

“You have my hand and my weapon,” he promised, handing the contract offer back to her. Now she smiled, her work complete.

“Excellent choice. Welcome to our first line of defense.”


	3. Smoke and Fire

The “Weald”, as the forest around Tauros was colloquially known, seemed to sap any spark of life out of the air around it. Even the sunlight, already dulled by a wispy, ragged layer of slate-gray clouds, appeared to be sucked into the forest and dissipated into nothingness.

Looking out upon the intractable wilderness from his position on the crumbling battlements of the town, Alasdair could feel nothing other than an ardent yearning to enter its domain and uncover its secrets.

_He’s out there. He has to be._

The bounty was still tucked against his thigh, protected from the merciless elements. He had made sure to pack only the hardiest of leathers for the job ahead; he couldn’t risk his most precious possession of the moment.

“Well, this has been fun,” Cordelia said, standing to his right. “But should we be going?”

“We should,” Alasdair agreed, licking his dry lips. The air smelled of manure intermingling with a faint tinge of something far more foul. Though the sun was blotted by clouds, not a drop of rain had yet fallen.

_A good omen for our journey_.

“We won’t have to walk far to the freehold in question,” Cordelia said, grabbing her satchel and musket and hoisting both onto her back. “It’s about a mile outside of town. But from there-”

“Who is she?” Alasdair asked.

“Who?”

“She’s waiting for us, remember?”

She had been waiting at the stairs to the ramparts, eyes concealed beneath a ragged, dirty hood. She had spoken only three words to them as they had ascended the stairs: _I’ll be waiting._

“Oh, Sigrid?” Cordelia said.

“I suppose that must be her,” Alasdair replied. As he rounded the corner to the stairs, he noticed she was still there; back to the wall, hood over her brow, looking straight ahead as though trying to discern something interesting out of the mundane fabric of the town before her.

“She’s accompanying us. She’s a falconer so she’s got some pretty solid tracking skills,” Cordelia said.

“So do I. Who said she’s coming with?” Alasdair asked.

“You can guess who,” Cordelia said, with a knowing smile.

_Damn that woman. I should’ve read her contract closer._

“I’m still waiting,” a hoarse voice from below called out. The woman below had quite the vocal fry, but it did not intimidate Alasdair. He was merely irritated.

“We’re ready,” he retorted.

“Just savoring the view!” Cordelia declared, trying her best to put on an air of cheer.

“Well if you’re done enjoying yourself, we have a job to do.”

_If this is who we’re going to be putting up with, count me out_ , Alasdair thought. Whoever this new woman was, her attitude was uncompromising. To some degree, he understood; life in Tauros certainly didn’t contribute positively to any one person’s quality of life. And yet, those who chose to come to Tauros, in general, came of their own volition. If she was not prepared for what awaited her in this horrid corner of the world, she could just leave.

“We’re going to move light and quickly. With luck, we’ll have tracks as soon as we get to the farm,” Sigrid said.

“Alasdair here is good at tracking,” Cordelia said. “Maybe he-”

“He can do what he is able on the ground,” Sigrid interrupted. “I have my own methods.”

Before they departed, Sigrid led them to an outbuilding just barely beyond the town walls, where screeches and chirping could be heard even from the outside.

_Well, what is a falconer without her falcon?_

“The mews are a bit dirty right now,” Sigrid said as she pulled out a small, rusty key and opened the kennel door. “My apologies.”

She entered the building but Alasdair and Cordelia hung back as soon as the sharp smell of urea assaulted them. They waited on the flanks of the building, hands over nostrils, until Sigrid returned with a medium-sized bird with dull brown and gray feathers, a white-capped head, and the eyes of an apex predator. Alasdair could feel the bird sizing him up even as Sigrid wrapped a leather hood around its head.

“Remy has been with me for three years. I trust him like I’d trust a lover,” Sigrid said, introducing her companion.

Cordelia reached out a hand towards the bird, but Sigrid pushed her aside quickly.

“He doesn’t like to be touched,” Sigrid said. “Except by me.”

Cordelia withdrew her hand, looking a little hurt, and silently fell into line as they set off down the Old Road in single file.

 

* * *

 

“Looks fairly abandoned to me.”

Cordelia was crouched in tall grass about five feet in front of them, scanning the freehold before them. Rows of wheat undulated in a chilly breeze, and the homestead before them was as quiet as the grave. But there was smoke rising from the chimney.

_And where there’s smoke, there’s fire._

“The chimney,” Alasdair pointed out.

“Could be leftovers,” Cordelia said.

“Not likely. It was said they’ve been gone for a week,” Alasdair said.

“Then we have unexpected company,” Sigrid muttered, and wrenched the hood off of her bird. Remy, looking rather relaxed, sat patiently like a soldier awaiting his marching orders.

She whispered something to the bird and it leapt out of her hands and into the air, effortlessly gliding up on the breeze and circling the house three or four times before returning to her glove, daintily settling back onto her forearm. He cocked his head twice, as if communicating to her.

“I don’t think he saw anybody,” Sigrid said.

“We should be careful regardless. I don’t like how this looks,” Alasdair said. Nobody disagreed with him, and so they carefully entered the wheat field and began pushing towards the house, trying their hardest to muffle their bootsteps.

_It’s entirely possible that other local farmers stopped by, perhaps to pay respects or something,_ Alasdair thought. _But it could be bandits. Or worse._

He wasn’t sure what kind of unholy creature would find a use for a roaring fire. That seemed almost...counterintuitive? Then again, what did he know?

“I think I see movement.”

Cordelia spoke, and all halted in their tracks. Alasdair peered through the rolling blades of wheat before him but could discern nothing from the gloomy husk of the house. The shutters on the windows had been torn off, interestingly enough, but he could find nothing of interest beyond them.

“I think we should assume the worst,” Sigrid said.

“Aye. Ready for battle,” Alasdair said, never one to turn down a good brawl.

“They could be locals-”

“We’ll find out soon enough,” Sigrid said, drawing a dagger out from a scabbard on her other forearm. The bird peered at the rusty steel curiously but remained silent and still.

They approached the house and stuck to the walls, careful to keep a low profile as they moved. For Alasdair, this was nothing new; hunting targets made a low profile absolutely necessary. He could tell the musketeer was uncomfortable, though. She gripped her weapon tightly, clutching it to her shoulder as if afraid to part with it, and he could see the tension ripple through her shoulders.

_Not used to getting in close, eh? Then leave this to me._ He drew his axe, rusted and chipped from abuse and lack of proper maintenance, and approached the nearest door. It opened without resistance, creaking only a little bit as an untimely breeze blew in.

It was enough to attract the attention of whoever was inside.

“Innis? Back already, eh?”

The voice was absolutely unfamiliar and it drove Alasdair into fight mode immediately. His axe already drawn, he raised it in preparation to strike, and charged into the house, all notions of stealth forgotten in the rush of battle. So quick he was that he nearly collided with the bandit as the latter emerged from his hiding spot, and Alasdair barely had time to step back and deflect an incoming blow from his newfound opponent.

He heard Cordelia shouting behind him, and another unfamiliar voice from further within the house.

_Doesn’t matter how many. Let’s get them._

The man’s drab brown clothing, tattered and splattered with dried mud, established him as some kind of outlaw. Regardless of his affiliation, the man was hostile, and he grit his teeth in anger as he made to swing his blade at Alasdair.

_A mistake_ , Alasdair thought, as he swiftly sidestepped the attack and drove his shoulder forward into the man, throwing him off balance. A successive swing of his axe caught the bandit in the shoulder and he howled in agony, his upper arm now bleeding profusely as Alasdair withdrew his weapon and prepared the finishing blow. It came quickly, and perhaps too mercifully.

A musket roared on the other side of the house, and his ears set to ringing as he stepped over the first corpse and prepared himself to strike another blow. There was shouting from nearby, and the voices sounded male; at least one voice, maybe two, contriving a chorus of terrified shouts and desperate yells. Clearly they had been caught unprepared for an attack.

A second bandit showed his face as Alasdair entered the hearth-room of the house, but he was forced to duck aside as the bandit pulled out an aged blunderbuss and took a shot at point blank range. The musket ball thankfully missed its mark as he ducked behind an overturned table, but he had no chance to challenge his attacker. The sound of flapping wings was all he heard before he saw the bandit shriek and collapse against the wall, a furious mass of brown feathers assaulting his face with all the vigor of a berserker.

“I give, I give!” the bandit screeched, attempting to shove Remy away with his arm. At the cue of a high-pitched whistle, the falcon disengaged, flying back and perching on a nearby chair, as if waiting for the next cue to strike.

“I give up!” the bandit reiterated, struggling to get back on his feet. His face was fairly untouched, but his exposed forearms were torn into bloody shreds by the falcon’s claws. His blunderbuss lay on the floor, unloaded and harmless. Nevertheless, Alasdair rushed in and kicked it aside, in case he attempted to make a final stand for himself.

“Did you see any others?” Alasdair asked, his heart throbbing like an energized beast.

“She shot one and I knifed another,” Sigrid replied, stepping into the room from behind him. “They’re both dead.”

“And I took care of another,” Alasdair said.

“Please, I yield!” the bandit cried again, exposing his bloody forearms in an expression of surrender. “Do not-”

“Shut the fuck up,” Sigrid snapped, her voice as threatening as a loaded weapon. “You want to finish him?”

Alasdair realized she was talking to him. He turned to her, her hood down and her light brown hair mussed and thick with grease, and then turned back to the bandit. The defenseless man had nothing left to say, as though he had now accepted his fate.

“We shouldn’t,” Alasdair said.

“Finish him,” Sigrid said.

“He could be an asset,” he replied.

“He could also be a liability,” Sigrid snapped as Cordelia walked into the room, stepping over the corpse carefully.

“I say we hold onto him. He could point us in the right direction,” Alasdair said.

“I’ll do whatever you need me to do. Just don’t…” The bandit could not finish his sentence, but there was no power now that could harm him. Sigrid’s shoulders slouched visibly, and she turned away from the scene, visibly and audibly disappointed.

“Tie him up good, then. If he escapes and slits our throats in the dead of night, it’s on you.”

 

* * *

 

They overnighted in the house, finding it quite hospitable in spite of its history. Alasdair, for his part, spent most of the rest of the day setting things into place and decamping in the hearth-room. They started a fire in the pit and were even able to roast a rabbit that Remy had caught.

But the night was not comfortable. Even with the company of Cordelia, Sigrid, and the nameless bandit now at the mercy of their flawed consciences, he could not help but feel uneasy. A similar effect was visible within the others. They talked, they even jested a little when Alasdair passed around a flask of decent quality liquor he had spirited away in his knapsack, but the shrill wails from the weald beyond unnerved all. Every few minutes, the wind would blow through the drafty home and carry with it a distant, anguished howl, and the smell of dessication. Before they went to bed, Alasdair made sure to make a round of the perimeter, and see what he could see.

He could see nothing, and at the time of his sentry, could hear nothing - but he could feel it.

The woods felt foreign, like no other territory had before. Alasdair was used to wild places, as bounties had a tendency to seek the most treacherous of terrain when they caught a whiff of the hunt, but this was something different.

He quickly retired inside, and as the wailing picked up again, he barred the door and extinguished their lantern.

_Nobody needs to know we’re here._

 

* * *

 

He awoke in the night to the sounds of scuffing shoes on floorboards, an imminent sign of danger. No stranger to nocturnal threats in wilder places, Alasdair threw off his blankets and reached for his axe, ready to strike. But the room he had chosen to sleep in was empty. The scuffing and bumping he heard came from elsewhere.

He woke himself up in a few seconds and, fully liberated from the grip of sleep, cautiously made his way into the hearth-room. The scene was immediately and obviously different. Cordelia slept soundly on the floor, her face buried in her rugged knapsack, but Sigrid and the bandit were gone.

_Damn that woman,_ Alasdair thought. _She will gut him and call me a fool._

He crept carefully through the hearth-room and towards the back of the house, where he spotted a dim light in the backyard. Ever keen and aware of potential danger, he dropped to a low crouch and shuffled forward, as he heard a muffled female voice that could only be the falconer.

“I told him you will talk. So you’re going to talk,” Sigrid said.

“I don’t know what you want me to say,” a low whisper said, the voice strained with fear. “I promised I would-”

“You’re going to lead us into some kind of ambush, aren’t you? Where you and your bandit friends slit our throats and rob us of all we have?”

He peered around the corner and saw them, barely illuminated by a dying candle. The bandit was still in his bonds, his back against the house wall and a knife pressed up against his throat, point-first. Sigrid, still in her daywear and with hood over her forehead, was kneeling in front of him, her falcon nowhere in sight.

_She really is some kind of creature_ , Alasdair thought, choosing to watch for a moment instead of intervene. Part of him was curious as to what Sigrid wanted; part of him also did not mind seeing the bandit suffer, so long as he survived the encounter.

“There is nothing planned,” the bandit replied, his voice now shaky but stern. “You killed all of my mates.”

“I don’t believe you,” she replied. “You’re lying scum.”

“No-”

“Fucking scum,” Sigrid hissed. Her voice carried not anger, but aversion, as though the pitiful creature squirming in front of her was repulsive in essence.

“I could cut you so much with this. You’ve already bled so much today,” she continued.

The bandit could do nothing with the knife pressed against his throat. Sigrid cupped a hand around his cheek, grabbing his jaw, and gave his head a little playful shake, as if this was some sadistic little game to her.

“I could cut your throat. But that would be easy.”

Alasdair felt like he needed to intervene. But he froze in his position, as of yet undiscovered.

“So many other places...right along the upper arm, like so-”

And she rolled her hand down his shoulder, continuing down his forearm and making certain to rake her nails across the angry red wounds. He winced in pain but did not cry out.

“I could make little slices all along here, too-”

She slid a finger down his chest, following the buttons of his shirt down to his navel and even further down, to his waist.

“I could take these off, too, you know-”

She gave his balls a rough squeeze, and Alasdair decided that enough was enough.

“Let him be,” he said, standing up and announcing his presence. Sigrid immediately backed away, turning the dagger towards her new challenger.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said, standing up.

“Neither should you.”

“I’m trying to help us,” Sigrid insisted.

“I disagree.”

Sigrid lowered the dagger, but even from underneath her hood he could tell that her gaze was as sharp and as dangerous as the steel was. The bandit, for his part, shuffled into a more comfortable position, obviously in pain from his torment.

“You’re not doing anything useful,” Alasdair said.

“It’s not your business,” Sigrid said.

“I’m tryi-”

“You shouldn’t be snooping at such an hour,” Sigrid said.

“And you shouldn’t be tormenting a man for fun.”

Sigrid wavered, on the precipice of saying something regretful. She hesitated, though, and carefully reworded her thoughts.

“I do what I think needs to be done.”

She pushed past him and quickly disappeared back into the house, leaving the candle behind. Alasdair snuffed it out, digging the heel of his boot into the wick to ensure the flame was dead, and then helped the bandit to his feet.

“Mind you, get back in that house and stay put for the rest of the night,” he hissed to the captive. “Just because I saved your ass doesn’t mean I’m your friend.”

He got the message. The two proceeded back into the house, Alasdair taking up the rear - _just to make sure everything is accounted for_.

He made certain to bar the back door, too.

_Nobody needs to know that we’re here. And nobody needs to be getting in._

The wailing from the weald resumed in earnest.


	4. Harpy

“How’d you sleep last night?”

“I slept? Huh, I didn’t know.”

Sigrid’s cynicism was wearing on Alasdair but he had no interest in calling her out, at least not before he had some food in his belly. Breakfast was still cooking in the pan, and he didn’t want to talk to Sigrid at all after last night. 

Cordelia was unfazed by Sigrid’s attitude and continued to tend to breakfast, preferring silence over an awkward, unpleasant conversation. 

_ It’s clear none of us slept last night _ , Alasdair thought. Between the confrontation he had suffered with Sigrid, and the constant chorus of howling from the weald, he had slept for maybe four hours total, and it was a restless sleep at that.

The clouds were parting somewhat, though, and the additional sunshine was quite welcome. The draft inside the house was still chilly, but Alasdair didn’t mind too much. At least it was morning, and some of the horror of the unknown was dispelled by the illumination of daytime.

“We’ll be entering the weald today,” Sigrid informed them. “Once we’re in, no more campfires. Enjoy this hot food while you can.”

“How long do you expect us to be in there?” Cordelia asked.

Sigrid puzzled over that for a few moments as the bacon sizzled and crackled.

“I would not go too deep. Lady Lancette told us not to go more than a few miles in,” Sigrid said. 

“It will be your first time,” Cordelia said, turning to Alasdair and smiling. “It’s always fun, the first time.”

“I’m no stranger to forests,” Alasdair replied. 

“This is no ordinary forest. You’ll see once we get in there,” Cordelia told him. 

_ If she’s trying to scare me, she’s going to have to try a little harder.  _ He wasn’t in the mood anyway, but even if this weald did seem to possess an air of evil spirit, it would be a trifling thing so long as he stuck with Sigrid and Cordelia. Going in alone would be a different matter, but with companions he could feel more secure. 

“I’m going to have one last look around the house before we go out,” Alasdair said. “We may have missed things yesterday.”

Surprisingly, Sigrid agreed with him.

“With broad daylight we may be able to spot something we missed,” she said, the first words she had spoken directly to him since last night. 

“Just don’t take too long,” Cordelia warned. “We want to get to a decent camping spot in the weald before dusk.”

“Aye.”

Both of them agreed.

_ It’s bad news to be caught in a forest at night without proper shelter. Any forest, really, but this one in particular.  _ He hadn’t even seen its innards yet, but he could guess by the sounds of the previous night that it harbored nothing of good nature or rationale. 

They ate their breakfast in relative silence, providing a bit of bread and water to their captive friend, and began skulking around the outside, looking for any kind of information that could be useful for their search. Cordelia took to interrogating the captive, though her demeanor was remarkably more gentle and accommodating than that of Sigrid. 

“You didn’t see any of them at all?”

“We arrived here just yesterday morning. There was no one else here, we thought it was abandoned,” the bandit promised, sitting in a chair on the front porch of the homestead.

“You didn’t see anybody around the property, either?”

“No ma’am. The place looked dead. And so we thought, we thought to-”

“Are you familiar with a man going by the name of Esteban?”

Alasdair figured that there would be no better time to intervene. Both the bandit and Cordelia turned to him.

“Could you repeat that name?” the bandit asked. 

“Esteban.”

“Last name?”

“It changes every few months,” Alasdair replied. 

“I can not help you,” the bandit admitted. 

_ It was worth a try.  _ Alasdair walked off without another word, disappointed but unsurprised.  _ He’s got to be out here somewhere. I know he’s haunting these woods.  _

He was about to go retrieve Sigrid and tell her that he was ready to pack up and move when he spotted something in the tall grass growing adjacent to the house. Something had been disturbed...the earth, just barely, and it looked like a footprint. But...

_ Different.  _ It was similar, but strangely flat, and larger than a regular footprint.  _ Somebody, or perhaps something, has been through here.  _

He knelt down to examine it in close detail and could discern nothing unique about it other than its unusual size and the lack of toe imprints. Whoever left such a mark behind must have been making their way towards the weald, because Alasdair found another footprint a little farther ahead, and then another ahead of it. The tracks, unless they deviated, would lead right off the property and into the nearby weald.

_ I think we’ve found our kidnapper.  _ Maybe not, but maybe so. It was worth investigating regardless. 

Cordelia and Sigrid were there within moments, leading the bound captive behind them, and Sigrid knelt down in the grass and carefully examined the marks. She began to follow them towards the woods, and found several more further ahead that Alasdair had missed.

“I’d say it’s a something, more than a somebody,” Alasdair ventured. To his surprise, Sigrid agreed.

“I’ve seen footprints like these before,” Sigrid said. 

“Something unpleasant,” Cordelia added. 

“A wicked kind of thrall,” Sigrid said. 

“What do you make of it?” Cordelia asked, to no one in particular.

“Could be our kidnappers,” Alasdair ventured. 

“Could be completely unrelated,” Sigrid said. “But it will be worthwhile to follow them regardless.”

Nobody disagreed; everyone knew they’d end up in the weald eventually. 

* * *

 

The weald was dark, dreary, and the air was thick with mold and the smell of decomposition. Immediately upon entering the outside fringes of that blighted forest, Alasdair noticed that much of the sunlight was blocked by a thick canopy of withered leaves, although he suspected something foul at play as well. The forest here was like the woods he had seen on the Old Road: blighted patches of bark, unnatural growths on limb and branch, and clumps of twisted fungal growths that seem to exude pestilence from every pore. The bushes here were gnarled, twisted things with potent thorns growing on every branch, and the grass underneath was a sickly brown color indicative of disease. Every so often leaves would fall from above, withered and dying as they slowly sailed down to their final resting place in the muddy turf below.

“Watch your step in here, bounty hunter,” Sigrid warned as they passed through a thicket of thorns and arrived onto what appeared to be a rough pathway. 

“I imagine this is an unfriendly place,” he said. 

“You’d imagine correctly,” Sigrid said. 

“Just keep an eye on your feet and keep a lit torch with you,” Cordelia said, amicably offering him a torch swathed in oil-soaked cloth. Alasdair happily accepted and spent a few moments using flint and tinder to spark it. After that, the path ahead of him did not seem so dark, though the brush to each side of it was cloaked in shadow, and he could not see very far beyond. 

“You take the lead, Alasdair,” Cordelia said, gripping her musket tightly. “You have the torch.”

_ Oh, sure. That’s why you want me in front.  _ Alasdair was familiar with the trappings of forests like this; bandits and rogues, eager to score coin and cunt, would fashion traps along pathways and trails to catch anyone not watching their step. He wasn’t too troubled by that possibility, but he didn’t want to bleed on his first expedition out. 

_ That would be an embarrassment, to put it lightly.  _

They proceeded further into the weald, the light growing dimmer with every step. The very air around them seemed to absorb any trace of sunlight, and within half an hour the only light they had was the glow of the torch. Thankfully, Cordelia had brought a small glass vial of kerosene and they were able to fashion branches from the forest around them into staves capable of being converted into torches. 

_ Thankfully they plan ahead. Clearly, I do not _ , Alasdair thought as he watched Cordelia soak some wrappings in the kerosene and gently tie them around a recovered branch, one that was clean of fungi.  _ I suppose there are lessons to be learned, even with as much- _

_ Wait.  _

He halted, and Sigrid almost ran into him from behind. 

“Why’d you stop?” she asked indignantly, but he did not respond. He bent down and rummaged through the dead leaves.

“Blood,” he said. 

“How much?” Sigrid asked. Remy ruffled his wings as he sat perched on her shoulder, eerily quiet for a bird of prey. 

“A little bit. I almost missed it,” Alasdair replied, spotting a few more droplets of light crimson liquid ahead. He walked a few paces forward and knelt down again, and found what he was looking for.

_ We have a trail. This could be what we’re looking for.  _

Obviously Cordelia now saw it too, and they wordlessly followed Alasdair as he marched forward, stopping every ten paces or so to briefly examine the ground. The trail, though faint, was there; the blood appeared human, too, judging by the color. Alasdair had little hope of finding the unfortunate bondsmen that they sought, but perhaps they could at least find bodies and belongings, and provide some closure to Lady Lancette. 

_ Shit, is it getting darker?  _

The torch was dying a bit but it felt like the shadows of the weald were pressing in even closer than before. 

_ It’s just your imagination. You’ll get used to it. This place...it’s… _

“More blood, Alasdair,” Sigrid said. He stopped again and looked down. Several large droplets on a bare patch of ground, the mud beneath his feet visibly red with blood as well.

“It goes to the right,” Alasdair muttered, looking over and seeing blood on the bushes off the trail. “Shall we?”

“After you,” Sigrid offered, in a tone that indicated she wanted nothing less than to turn around and go back home. But they had to press on. Returning empty-handed, it was insinuated, was not an option to take.

Alasdair led the party off the path, taking a moment to stop as Cordelia and the bandit got caught up in thorn bushes. Now that they were in rougher territory, it was more difficult to move forward. The mushrooms grew larger in size and abundance, and insects of abnormal size clambered around the diseased bark of the trees. The heavy air stunk of rot and feces. 

_ I think,  _ Alasdair thought,  _ that it may be time to ask for a change of occupation.  _ Of course, he never could abandon his beloved profession, but the smell here was enough to make him consider it. 

Then he saw the body. 

“Up ahead,” he whispered, pressing a thick cheesecloth up against his nose and mouth as airborne spores became more ubiquitous around him. 

Sigrid and Cordelia both saw it too, and the former whispered something to her bird. Alasdair continued to lead the way, though he took every step lightly and moved more slowly, fearing ambush or trouble. The body lay ahead in a clearing, slumped against a warped oak tree. The grass and dirt beneath him was soaked through with blood, and Alasdair wondered how long he had been there.

To his surprise, the body shifted as he approached, and he instinctively drew his axe before he heard speech.

“Water,” the man groaned, and as he looked up to meet Alasdair’s eyes, the latter realized the man, while still breathing, was perhaps on the brink of death.

“He’s still alive,” Alasdair informed the others, who were still struggling through the brambles.

“Water-”

“Who is he?” Cordelia asked. 

“He’s one of ours,” the bandit piped up.

“One of yours?” Alasdair asked.

“Water, please,” the man begged, his voice hoarse and as dry as a rock. 

“He was at the house with us, he left to find firewood and food,” their captive said. 

“Get him some water. Canteen!” Alasdair said, approaching the dying man and examining his wounds. Though it was difficult to see in the faltering light and through such thick clothing, the damage was evident; his woolens were soaked with blood and three large gashes had been ripped in the breast of his leather hauberk. Whatever had attacked him had not only done significant damage, but was also most certainly not human.

“This is dark work,” Sigrid muttered as she approached the scene. Cordelia brought the injured man water and the captive, in spite of his bonds, knelt down by his friend and attempted to assist him.

“Kalen? It’s me,” he said. The injured man, his skin as pale as snow, mustered enough energy to look up.

“Norr?”

“It’s me!” the captive Norr exclaimed, perhaps a little louder than he should have.

“Norr...water,” the injured man begged, even though Cordelia had given him a decent drink. She moved to give him the canteen again, but Alasdair stopped her.

_ He’s not long for this world _ . They both knew it. 

“Kalen, who did this to you?” Norr demanded, but the bandit Kalen could only mutter something inaudible. Even Norr, sitting right next to him, had to lean in and let him whisper in his ear. 

“What did he say?” Alasdair asked.

Norr hesitated, as though unsure. He stumbled over his words before responding clearly.

“He says...it was the harpy.”

_ The what?  _

An uncomfortable pause occurred before Kalen gave his last breath and life left him. Norr did not weep nor react to his death, other than grab his hand and give it one final squeeze before letting go and rising to his feet again. He said nothing after that.

“Harpy,” Alasdair muttered, as though turning the word over in his head. 

“Are you sure that’s what he said?” Cordelia asked.

“I don’t think he could’ve confused it for another word.” 

“But what does it mean?”

_ Beats me. But it doesn’t sound like anything good,  _ Alasdair thought. They spent a moment searching Kalen’s corpse, but his weapon was dull and rusted and he had only a few copper coins on his person. Nothing worth taking.

_ Time to go. Something about all this feels wrong.  _ He felt exposed in the clearing, too, open to prying eyes watching from the trees around him. He wanted desperately to return to cover, to be able to hide from whatever might be out there in the weald. Cordelia, too, looked uncomfortable, and Norr was trembling. Sigrid was the only one who looked calm and controlled, though Remy fidgeted on her shoulder and was peering right to left rapidly, as though looking for potential threats. 

“Well, we found at least one corpse,” Sigrid said. “That’s better than no corpses.”

Her joke was unappreciated. Alasdair led the way back into the brush again, the flame of his torch nearly withered down to a smoulder. He wasn’t keen on stopping now to relight it, though.  _ Just get back to the trail. Maybe we can even decide on turning back and returning home.  _

The tail of his overcoat caught on some thorns and he cursed under his breath as he struggled to free himself. The air, he realized, was cooler now, and carried with it the smell of something worse than rotting vegetation.  _ Rotting flesh, for sure.  _

“Smell that?” Cordelia murmured behind him. No one responded. They all smelled it, of course. 

Alasdair was nearly to the trail when it hit him. A cold wind, frigid and scathing, rushed past him and extinguished his torch, carrying with it the powerful smell of dead flesh. He instinctively dropped to his knees, and could tell by the foliage around him that he was right on the edge of the trail, just barely obscured by brush.

Everyone behind him stopped. He could hear rustling but nobody spoke. The wind grew stronger and the smell grew fouler, and as he knelt down in the weeds Alasdair could hear footsteps. Distant, but growing closer.

Crunching leaves and squishing mud, and a low voice... _ humming _ ? No, some kind of incantation, intoned in a scratchy, inhuman voice. It grew louder with the footsteps, but Alasdair could see nothing. But he could smell it, and  _ fuck  _ did it stink like decomposing meat. The voice passed by him with the footsteps, and he swore he could hear the rustle of cloth and the clatter of something hard as whatever it was passed.

_ Whatever it was. I have no idea, but that was not a human being.  _

A cold sweat had broken out on his brow and beads of salty sweat ran down into his eye, but he dared not move to counter them until the smell began to dissipate and he could hear the voice no longer. Only then did he move, and dare to stand back up again. 

“Cordelia. Kerosene,” Alasdair asked. A shaky hand reached out to him with a half-empty vial and he gladly took it, struggling to douse the cloth and relight the torch. By the time he did so, the air had regained its usual temperature and the smell was long gone, though the faint stench of decomposing leaves remained.

“A great evil stalks these woods,” Sigrid murmured. The bird on her shoulder was hunched over, and Alasdair pitied the poor, frightened creature. 

“What was that?” Alasdair asked.

“Harpy,” Norr muttered, and Alasdair began connecting some dots. He wasn’t sure what the creature was, but it was most certainly hostile and borne of dark, unnatural forces.

“We got lucky there,” Alasdair muttered. 

“We would’ve stumbled right into it, aye,” Sigrid said. “We need to be more careful.”

“We should head back,” Norr insisted. 

“We can’t,” Sigrid said, shaking her head. “We have a job to do here.”

_ I appreciate your dedication, but I agree with him. I put more value in my life than in my paycheck _ . But Alasdair would not argue. There was no point in debating her, now that she had set her mind to the task at hand. Alasdair also wanted to stay mobile, and keep pressing on; it was entirely possible that whatever had passed them by earlier would be returning in the other direction, and he was not keen on meeting it again.

“We need to head deeper into the forest,” Sigrid said. 

“You think it wise to press on?”

Sigrid paused, and despite the dimness of the torchlight he could tell she was glaring right at him.

“I want my paycheck. And you want yours. So let’s go.”

He had neither the strength nor the willpower to argue with that. And so Sigrid took the lead, and they moved on once more. 


	5. Gathering

It was impossible to sleep in the weald. The forest was alive with noise, a din of howling and screeching that in spite of all its fright did not appear to threaten them. Alasdair had made certain to pick a secure camping spot, perched upon a hill overlooking a vast swath of the weald, and they were taking shifts. As he sat up against a mossy rock and looked out over the treetops, he could feel secure for the first time since entering the forest.

But the smell had not yet dissipated. Even higher up above the foliage, where the air was fresher, the rank smell of rot still assailed his nostrils. He had taken to wrapping his cheesecloth around the lower half of his face for good measure, providing some means of defense against the stench. 

“Alasdair.”

The whisper made him jump. Cordelia was right behind him, kneeling down beside his rock and clutching a torch in her left hand. Her musket, naturally, was in the other. 

“Is it time?”

“Just about. Wish I had a timepiece,” Cordelia said, keeping her voice hushed. They had no interest in attracting unwanted attention, particularly after their encounter earlier in the day had left everyone so shaken up.

“Yeah. Well.”

“Get your rest,” she said. 

“I can’t sleep,” he replied. 

“Well, you’re going to have to. We’re setting out again in the morning.”

“What do you think, Cordelia?”

She hesitated and turned to him, her brow furrowed in confusion.

“Think about what, now?”

“Was I right to do this?”

“You need your rest.”

“No. Not just this. Was I right to come out here just to look for money?”

Cordelia did not respond. He could hear her audibly sigh but it was contained, as though she was considering an answer. He decided to beat her to it.

“Why did you come here?”

“Sense of duty,” she replied quickly.

“Bullshit,” he said. “Tell me more.”

“I used to be a soldier, Alasdair.”

“Where’d you come from?”

“Does it matter?” 

“Not really. You just never mentioned it,” he said.

“It’s not important. What is important is that I fought. I killed.”

“That makes two of us,” Alasdair grunted.

“But I couldn’t just do that,” she continued. “I needed to have a purpose. There is no purpose in killing men.”

“I disagree.”

“But killing in a place like this,” Cordelia said, spreading her arms in front of her to encompass the weald before them, “that has purpose.”

_ Ironic, that all you’ve done so far is kill a bandit.  _ He thought it, but did not say it. Come to think of it, he was kind of tired.

“I suppose I can understand.”

“Not everyone needs some kind of grand design, Alasdair,” she said. “Sometimes simple is better.”

“We all need to put food on the table.”

“Yes,” she said, taking a deep breath. “Yes we do. Now go to bed.”

There was no point in arguing. He left her to her watch and returned to his tent, and crashed within minutes. 

* * *

 

“Alasdair, take the front. I think we have tracks.”

Alasdair did not hesitate a moment. He pushed past Norr, who was trying to scratch at a bulbous pimple on the side of his neck, and came to Cordelia’s side, taking her torch and bending down to study the patchwork of leaves below. 

“We do,” Alasdair confirmed, brushing some leaves aside. They were faint and difficult to see, but the outline of a large, toeless foot was there. 

“Is it human?” Sigrid asked from further back. 

“No. It’s one of them,” Alasdair said.  _ You know what I’m talking about. What else could it be?  _

“Hmmm,” Sigrid grunted. “See if you can find any more ahead.”

There were definitely more further ahead. The leaves were disturbed, and the tracks were clearer to see the further they pressed on. 

_ These are getting fresher. We’re on a hot trail.  _

For the first time since entering the weald, Alasdair began feeling excitement, adrenaline in the blood. There was a hunt afoot, and he was at the vanguard. He didn’t care who or what it was, it just felt good to be  _ hunting _ , to be on the chase. 

“They don’t look human to me,” Sigrid said as she observed some of the fresher footprints.

“No, not at all,” Alasdair agreed. “Do you know what to expect?”

“In these woods? Could be anything. But it’s almost certainly deadly.”

_ Thanks for that motivation, there.  _ Any rebuttals that he had in mind dissipated as he continued to follow the tracks through thicker, rougher foliage. They were still on a pathway but it was clearly less-used and had not been tended to in some time, perhaps years. Thorn bushes tore at his cloak as he walked and the tree branches above him swayed and creaked menacingly, as though under the influence of some malevolent force trying to unnerve him and worm their way into his thoughts. 

_ The deeper we’re in here, the darker it’s getting _ , he observed. At this point, the only light they really had was the light of the torch, and they were starting to run low on kerosene fluid. What Cordelia had stowed away would last them perhaps the rest of the day and the next morning, if they used it sparingly.

“There’s a smell in the air,” Sigrid noted as she hesitated, her nose wrinkling. 

“This whole place smells,” Alasdair said. “Are you sure you-”

Alasdair stopped, and it hit him too.  _ Something different.  _ It was like some unholy mixture of decomposition and woodsmoke, inhaled involuntarily. 

“Smells like something is burning,” Cordelia said. 

“It’s about time someone set this place alight,” Sigrid muttered. Alasdair began moving at a brisk pace now, trying his best to keep a light foot as he stumbled through the brush while following the scent, As ghastly as it was, he felt obligated to investigate this abnormality. 

_ But cautiously _ , part of his brain told him.  _ This could be a trap.  _

He could see a clearing ahead, where sunlight actually managed to struggle through the thick foliage and spread its warmth onto the muddy turf. There was another form of light there too, dirtier and duller, and he could see the smoke now.

_ Who could it be? It must be human of some sort, right? Beasts would not do such a thing.  _

“Alasdair, hold on a moment,” Sigrid said from behind.

“We’re almost there, just wait-”

“No, Alasdair!” Sigrid hissed, and he reluctantly stopped. Now only fifty feet from the clearing, he could hear sounds - something that sounded like a drumbeat, foreboding and unnerving, and what sounded somewhat like a human voice, warped and perverted. 

“What?”

“Hold up. Let’s get a better view,” Sigrid insisted, and looked over at Remy. The bird seemed to know exactly what to do; without a sound, he leapt into the air and rushed up into the canopy, vanishing above a series of intertwining branches and sickly green vines. They hunkered down in the brush as the light ahead waxed and waned, as though dancing in rhythm to the growing drumbeat. Remy did not take long on his mission - within two minutes he had alighted again on Sigrid’s shoulder, ruffling his feathers menacingly and looking around as though perturbed.

“Whatever it is, he doesn’t like it,” Sigrid reported. 

Alasdair was not about to ask how she learned such things from it, but judging by the increasing intensity of the drumbeat the situation was heating up. At this point, he was tempted to turn back and return to the trail they had been treading earlier, which would lead them out of the weald and back to the relative safety of Tauros and the surrounding area. But...they had a job to do.

_ And I have a man to find.  _

Esteban’s whereabouts now bothering him more than ever, he rose, itching for action.

“Whatever it is, we have to investigate,” Alasdair said. 

“That’s an easy way to get yourself killed,” Sigrid warned. 

“Well, we’ve got four people,” he said.

“Three,” Sigrid corrected. 

“Untie him.”

“Oh, what a great idea, I want to get my throat slit in the night,” Sigrid said, her volume rising to meet her sarcastic tone. 

“This is no time to argue,” Alasdair said. “You can tie him up again afterwards. But another sword at my side would be very comforting.”

“I agree with Alasdair,” Cordelia added. “For what it’s worth.”

Sigrid grimaced. Norr, having remained silent the entire time, was nearly jumping at the chance to fight. Maybe he thought he could drive a knife between somebody’s ribs and run for it, but alone in this forest, what chance would he stand?  _ He may be a bandit, but he’s not stupid.  _

“He’s your responsibility, then,” Sigrid finally conceded, glaring at Alasdair in particular.  _ She won’t let me forget that anytime soon.  _

“You’ll owe me,” Alasdair whispered to Norr, who gratefully extended his hands and allowed Alasdair to untie his bonds as the others pulled out their weapons. Sigrid withdrew a short kukri-like blade and Cordelia loaded her musket, struggling to cope with the thickets and thorn bushes nagging her at every turn. Alasdair handed Norr one of his backup blades, little more than a longer dagger, and hoped that if they fought Norr might actually prove himself useful. 

“Let’s get in closer. It could be humans,” Alasdair said. 

“Could be worse, too,” Sigrid muttered, but they pressed on. Now Sigrid was hanging back, her bird unhooded but silent and still. Alasdair and Norr took the lead, and Cordelia went right behind them, crouched low so as to avoid detection. 

The clearing ahead of them was full of life, though not the wholesome and palatable kind that men have grown used to. The majority of the bodies who were a part of this strange and sinister gathering were bulky, sinewy creatures, flesh corrupted and twisted into a knotty, leathery form unknown to any healthy human being. Fungi grew on their shoulders and backs, black fluid and pus leaked from the open, festering sores on their limbs. In the midst of these creatures sat three human figures, bound to a pole, their heads covered in ratty burlap sacks. Something else stood over them - not quite man, not quite monster, but existing at some hellish point in-between. The figure was hunchbacked and gaunt, and somewhat feminine, her facial features visibly withered even from a distance. She was shuffling from one end of the circle to the other, chanting and incanting without any mind to the creatures around her. The drumbeat seemed to come from nowhere, and that was perhaps the most disturbing part.

_ Dark things are happening here. We have to stop them.  _ Alasdair’s natural instinct, of course, was to plunge right into the fray and begin attacking, if only to sate his urge for a good brawl. But he withheld himself and watched as the crone approached one of the figures in the center of the circle, her intentions obviously malicious. 

She untied the bonds of one of the figures, the largest of them, and dragged him away from the pole in spite of his struggling. Over the drumbeat and the strange murmuring that seemed to increase in volume with each passing second, Alasdair could hear a man’s voice -

“Let me go! Let me go you bastard!”

It was muted by the cloth but it remained audible. His exhortations were of no use, though, as a few of the automatons surrounding the others walked over to assist the crone and held the man down as he was draped over a flat-top boulder, arms and legs held at length by the monsters as the crone held some fetid censer over him and began chanting more vigorously. The man’s shouting turned to screaming, as he struggled in vain to free himself from his captors.

And then, the knife. It was then that Alasdair knew he had to take action. 

_ We can save the others, if not him,  _ Alasdair knew, as the crone brought the knife down to pierce the man’s chest. Then Alasdair leapt from the bushes. 

The automatons nearest to him turned towards him first, and he realized then that they possessed neither eyes nor mouths, or any visible facial features at all. Where their face would normally be, he could only see twisted flesh and fungal matter, marred and scarred by some dark art beyond his comprehension. They stumbled towards him as Norr and Sigrid rushed out of the brush, evidently pressed into action by Alasdair’s impetuous decision. The others turned towards him as well, and Alasdair found himself facing almost ten fungal automatons, reaching their long, gnarly limbs out towards him as they began stumbling forward.

A musket roared and the crone, her knife still embedded in the man’s heart, shrieked and collapsed, her gnarled hands grasping at her shoulder. 

Sigrid’s falcon launched itself into the air and propelled itself down at the nearest creature, seeking eyes or sensitive spots to dig its claws into. It failed to find anything and instead found itself fluttering uselessly above them, as they began swiping and clawing in an attempt to down him. 

Alasdair, for his part, rushed into the fray with little regard for his own security. His pulse throbbing in his temple, he swung his axe at the nearest fungal creature, driving his axe deep within its blighted flesh, nearly taking the entire limb off in the process. The creature swiped at him but he found its groping claw easy to dodge and, taking a step back, kicked it in the chest to knock it to the ground. But he had no time to finish it off; another approached him, pushed aside by the charging Norr, and he had to dodge its macilent claws and strike it several times with his axe before it stumbled, severely injured and disoriented. 

And now the crone was exposed. Injured and bleeding some mixture of blood and pus, she struggled to reach for her censer, knocked to the side due to her flailing. The blood of the sacrificed man and the crone’s own mingled on the ground in a viscous puddle, one that Alasdair was more than happy to splash through as he bore down on the crone and, without a second thought, crowned her with his axe, splitting her gaunt head in twain and ending her incantations for good. 

Alasdair’s breathing slowed and his pulse leveled as the carnage ended around him. Cordelia struggled to reload her musket, having only made one shot throughout the fight. A gash on Norr’s arm bled through his overcoat, and he was on top of a scratcher trying to drive his knife deep enough through its throat to finish it off. Sigrid checked the prisoners; one of them was bleeding and looked uncomfortably pale, while the other was alive but shaken.

_ At least one of them might make it out okay. These could be what we’re looking for.  _

“These bastards are tough,” Norr swore, rubbing his injury with a swath of cloth he had torn off from his sleeve. “Their skin doesn’t give easily.”

“It’s not really skin. It’s some kind of...exoskeleton,” Sigrid said, struggling to cut away at the ties binding the other two prisoners. Their heads still covered by hoods, they were still unaware of the fate of their fellow prisoner. 

“I don’t know if I’d call it that,” Alasdair said. 

“I don’t know  _ what  _ I’d call it,” Norr grunted. “Tough bastards...sons of bitches…”

Cordelia rushed to help him with his injury as Alasdair set to the prisoners. Now that he could examine them up close, he could tell they were young. Small, frail looking too, they could be no older than teenagers, if that. Alasdair untied the ropes binding their hands, the fibrous bonds no match for his own calloused fingers. 

As the hoods came off it was clear the prisoners had not been silenced by any means but fear. Even with their abductors slain and the fight resolved, they trembled at Alasdair’s touch and made wild eye movements, seeking some sense of security in their situation. 

_ One male, one female...I can already add up what happened here. And who the poor sap on the rock is.  _

The young girl’s crying upon seeing the body confirmed his theory. He tried his best to guide her gaze away but it took both him and Cordelia to haul her off, while Sigrid took ahold of the boy and hauled him over her shoulder. 

They left the bodies behind, unburied.

_ Let the weald eat them. It’s only right.  _

* * *

 

“I don’t think the boy’s going to make it,” Cordelia whispered.

They had returned to their previous campsite and now that the sun was setting, that unfamiliar sense of unease crept back into Alasdair’s mind, gnawing away at him as he looked over the two kids, wrapped up in woolens and tended to as best as possible. 

“I did all I could,” Cordelia said.

“His wounds were bad. Looked like he had been stabbed in an altercation,” Alasdair said. 

“Well,” Sigrid said, staring down at the campfire as she came to terms. “How about the girl?”

“She’s fine. She was shaken up, but she’s already asleep and her scratches are minor,” Cordelia reported. 

“Boy’s asleep too?”

“Yes, but I think it will be a very deep sleep.”

_ If it must be so.  _ They bowed their heads in silence and sat around the crackling fire, letting it slowly eat away at its fuel unhampered. The last vestiges of sunlight vanished behind the horizon and the weald came to life with all of its horror, the shrieks and the howling intensified in volume. They were situated on a high ledge, though, and had an advantage over anything that might try and assail their camping spot.

_ That, and the fact that we have an extra set of hands at our disposal now, is some small comfort.  _

Norr, in spite of his injuries, seemed to be in good spirits. He had taken down three of the fungal scratchers in the fight and had proven himself to Alasdair and Cordelia, who had argued for his freedom. Sigrid had disapproved, but outnumbered as she was there was nothing she could do but let the majority’s will win out. 

_ He may face justice when he returns to town, but for tonight he is a free man.  _ He had even been allowed to keep his blade, and sleep apart from them. 

_ Besides, he wouldn’t try to make a run for it in the weald alone. That would be suicide. He knows it, and he knows we know it.  _

“Lady Lancette will want to know about these things immediately,” Sigrid said. 

“We will get everything to her,” Alasdair promised. 

“She will want to take further action.”

“I know.”

Another moment of silence. 

“I am going to sleep,” Sigrid announced. Nobody responded to her, or bid her goodnight, but they let her leave the fire without another word. Norr, too, retired to his makeshift tent to nurse his bandaged wound and rest. Cordelia and Alasdair remained in place, and he decided to break the silence. 

“Where did you serve?”

“Pardon me?”

“I mean, uh...what banner did you fight under?” he asked again. “Back when you served.”

“You asked that this morning.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said, throwing his hands up as though caught guilty. “I’m just a stubborn asshole.”

Cordelia chuckled.

“Yeah, I can tell,” she said. “I served for four years in a standing army. The Duchy of Tenarum.”

“No shit, huh?”   
“What?”

“I come from Latinum.”

She chuckled at that, a dark laugh.

“Well,” she said, smiling devilishly. “Looks like we’re enemies, huh?”

“We could be.”

“When’s the last time they fought a war?”

“You’d know better than I,” Alasdair admitted.

“I left the service six years ago. I did my share. I grew tired of the regimentalization, and the constant...well, just wear and tear,” she said. 

“Tired of killing, too?”   
“I told you I never enjoyed it,” she reminded him.

“Then why did you join?”

“The call of duty. And the camaraderie. It means a lot to me. And the military is more than just killing. It’s killing, but for a purpose.”

“You ever fight against Latinum?”

“Twice,” she replied. “I have no regrets about what I did.”   
“I didn’t ask you to have regrets. I have no connections back there.”

“I imagine,” she said. “Being a bounty hunter and all.”

“It’s a different life,” Alasdair explained. “You don’t wear someone’s colors. No oaths of fealty, except to yourself. You make your own bed and your own money. And the only thing guiding your life is-”

“A little piece of paper.”

He hesitated.

“Aye. A little piece of paper.” He tapped his thigh just to be certain it was still there.  _ Still there. Still safe.  _

The weald shrieked as the fire crackled and belched a thin column of smoke into the dark sky. They held their hands towards the flame and sat there in silence as the rescued boy, having never told them his name, passed away silently. 


	6. Any Other Place

They buried the boy in the morning, a shallow grave.

_ He deserved better. But we could only give him so much.  _

They retraced their steps back to the farmhouse where they had overnighted, taking turns carrying the girl on their back.

_ The smell of fresh air is almost...foreign now.  _

They paused at the farmhouse for a brief lunch and interrogated the girl, hoping to get some information out of her. She did admit that the farmhouse was hers, and had belonged to her father before their unfortunate turn of events.

_ Well, that answers that question. And a few others.  _

By afternoon, they had returned to Tauros, just as thick, black clouds were gathering on the western horizon. A chilly wind blew up from the west, and Alasdair could tell it was no normal storm.

_ No, nothing is normal here. Not even the air and the trees are normal. It is all perversion.  _

The guards at the gate admitted them without question, having seen them pass out only a couple of days previously. On the way in they found a few familiar faces at the entrance, talking to a few guards, including one who appeared better maintained and cleaner than his comrades. 

“Well, you three made it back alive,” Dismas the highwayman greeted them, running his thumb along his dagger’s sheath idly. “And picked up a fourth on the way, it seems.”

“Salutations!” Reynauld greeted them with more cheer. “How is the forest doing?”

“As horrid as always,” Sigrid replied.

“Well, we expected no different,” Dismas said. “We can safely say that the old ruins are also just as horrid.”

“When did you get back?” Alasdair asked. 

“Just in the past thirty minutes or so,” Reynauld replied. “We were bringing Katherine here back to get medical attention.”

“One of the rabble got to her,” said Dismas. “I was running out of shots.” He tapped the engraved handle of his flintlock for effect, and grinned. 

“Well, we were undersupplied anyway. We wouldn’t have made it far,” Reynauld said. 

“We’ll be back there, soon,” Dismas promised. “They’ll be missing us.”

“Come, Dismas,” Reynauld said. “Let’s make sure Katherine is in good hands. We can grab a drink after that.”

“If you insist.”

The pair departed as the gate guards asked a few questions to Sigrid about their expedition. Nothing too difficult to answer;  _ where were you going? What was your purpose? Is anyone hurt or ill? Anything else we should know?  _ In a few moments, they were on their way and entering the outskirts of town, passing fallow fields and empty plots of land devoid of toil as they went. 

_ If there were any other place in the world as depressing as Tauros,  _ Alasdair thought,  _ it would have to be in hell itself.  _

* * *

 

They were informed that Emilia would be a few minutes before she could speak with them. The courtier standing idly beside her working desk in the keep made it clear that they would not have their audience until she was ready to see them. As he would not budge, they waited until she stepped into the chamber about five minutes after their arrival, visibly disheveled and apparently not expecting company. Her dirty brown hair was mussed, her normally pale cheeks looked flushed, and her clothing lay a bit loose on her body, as though she had dressed in a hurry.

“I was thinking you would be back later,” Emilia said, sitting down at her desk on the raised platform before them without further ado. 

“We found our objective,” Alasdair said. 

“What happened to the musketeer?” 

“She’s taking an injured girl to the medical ward,” Sigrid replied. “She’s fine. We’re all fine. Cuts and bruises, little more.”

“Good, good,” Emilia chirped. “I presume you found the missing bondsmen?”

“One of them dead when we got there. One of them died on the way back. A girl survived, though,” Sigrid reported. 

_ We could have saved the father, come to think of it. If we had acted quicker. _

“How old?”

“She can be no older than eleven or twelve. She hasn’t said much to us since we picked her up,” said Alasdair. 

“Traumatized, I’m sure,” Emilia said. Alasdair observed that she was scrawling furiously on a small piece of parchment, concealing her scribbling behind a mountain of paperwork and empty ink bottles.  _ Why bother hiding it?  _

“We have more to report-”

“Yes, do go on.”

“Something else has been stirring in the weald,” Sigrid said.

Emilia stopped writing briefly and locked eyes with Sigrid, her gaze betraying both concern and curiosity. She jerked her head to signal Sigrid to continue. 

“There’s certainly a design to the corruption there. We encountered some of the creatures-”

“I’ve taken to calling them fungal scratchers,” Emilia reminded her. “A name suggested by Dismas.”

“Why, is it because they tore his arm up once and he didn’t want to make a big deal of it?”

“Something like that,” Emilia said, and flourished for her to continue. Alasdair stood patiently by as Sigrid continued to provide her report on the crone, and the ritual they had stumbled upon. 

_ I don’t think words can properly describe it, but you’re welcome to try,  _ he thought as Sigrid attempted to explain in a sensible way what they had encountered and heard. Emilia did not appear the least bit troubled; then again, this was her estate, and she knew it better than anybody. 

“How interesting,” she said finally, after the report was done. Then she turned her curious eyes upon Alasdair, who found himself in her spotlight without a second’s notice. 

“And you, bounty hunter?”

“Yes, me?” 

“What did you see?”

_ Oh, fuck. I don’t want to talk.  _ But he did talk; essentially, he sold a shorter version of the story Sigrid had told, and decided to leave out the part where he stumbled upon her torturing Norr. That, he figured, was best left forgotten. 

_ Oh, and what about Norr? Ah, it’s not worth mentioning, really. But he did...ah, fuck it.  _ He decided to interject before she dismissed them. 

“Thank you for your-”

“There was something I wanted to mention, something else,” he said. “Something Sigrid didn’t mention.”

“Oh? We-”

“Our captive, a man by the name of Norr-” 

Sigrid’s jaw clenched and he could see her eyes start to quiver with anger.  _ She isn’t going to like this. Well, too bad.  _

“He was a bandit that we captured at the farmhouse, as we both mentioned,” Alasdair continued. “But he proved to be a very useful ally.”

“How so?” Emilia asked. She either did not notice, or did not care, that Sigrid was growing visibly perturbed. 

“He fought alongside us, when we broke that ritual and killed the crone. We gave him a blade...and maybe, maybe it wasn’t the best decision.”

_ But we did it anyway.  _

“But he fought and he killed two of the scratchers, and helped kill a third, and if not for him, we may have had to retreat from the fight,” he said. “He will be in the dungeon by now. Spare him a thought.”

And with that, he was finished. Sigrid did look relieved, to his surprise.  _ Perhaps she thought I was going to indict her. Not today. But that  _ is  _ some useful blackmail material, if I have a way to prove it.  _

Emilia scratched a few more words onto her parchment, before looking back up at them.

“Thank you, both of you,” Emilia said. “You are free to go. I will speak to you both soon.”

They gave a brief bow, as perfunctory as possible, and hurried out of the great hall. As soon as they were in the corridor outside, Sigrid laid into him.

“You think she’s going to give a damn about him?”

“She might, I tried my best,” Alasdair said, shrugging. 

“He’s a fucking thug,” she swore. “He deserves the rope, and nothing else.”

“Why didn’t you just kill him yourself, then, if you think that?”

“Because I believe in justice,” Sigrid said. 

Alasdair snorted.

“Yeah, sure. Only if said justice involves torturing prisoners in the dead of night.”

Sigrid swore and hurried off in a different direction, leaving Alasdair to his own machinations. Rather than attempt to assuage her or report her behavior to Emilia, he decided to head back into town and take care of his own business.  _ She’ll forget about it by tomorrow. And hopefully Emilia gives the man some consideration. He may yet be useful.  _

Rain splattered on the cobblestone steps leading down from the keep as he exited and made his way back into town. Examining his gear, he found that his axe had suffered a dent during his last engagement, rendering it less than ideal for future combat. He figured it would be worth making a stop to wherever the local smithy was in this town; better to be safe, than sorry.

_ Can’t be losing bounties on account of a dull blade. Particularly this bounty.  _

The paper was still there. He made sure it was warm and dry in its little pocket as the rain started coming down harder, the clouds overhead threatening deluge as they gathered to commit to the storm. He rushed as quickly as he could to the building he assumed to be the smithy; with a massive chimney and several wooden bins of coal sitting off to the side of the building, it was a safe assumption to make. 

The interior was warm, almost  _ too  _ warm. Fire could be heard crackling from somewhere in the back, and he could smell coal smoke and beeswax, a strangely alluring scent when they were paired together. Looking around him, he could see the fruits of a man’s labor piling up without organisation; here a finely-crafted nasal helm, there several spearheads lying in a heap, and discarded scrap metal could be seen all over. There were crates and boxes aplenty, too, but many of them were empty and those that were occupied contained little more than poorly-wrought pig iron and excess materials.

“Who’s comin’ in?” a voice called from the back, brusque and unpleasant. He heard footsteps, and figured that he’d better announce himself.

“A man looking for service,” Alasdair called back. 

“You a soldier?”

_ I guess.  _

“Of a sort,” Alasdair replied, raising his voice as the sound of a blast furnace roaring threatened to drown him out. 

“Alright, gimme a minute, lad. Help yerself to some ale while you’re at it, I got some extra on the counter,” the voice replied. Alasdair looked to his right and for the first time saw what appeared to be some kind of a service counter, partially blocked off by a set of iron bars driven into the ceiling. He found a clay pot that reeked of ale but was, quite distressingly, nearly empty. 

Mere seconds later a portly, red-bearded man stumbled into the anteroom, bearing with him the tools of his trade and a flask of what Alasdair presumed was alcohol. 

“The name’s Boswick. William Boswick,” the smith greeted him, extending a gloved, grease-smeared hand out. Alasdair returned the handshake and found his own fingers covered in grease and coal dust.  _ Unpleasant, but I wasn’t in any mood to get a meal anyway.  _

“Alasdair. Macdougall.”

“You’ve got the look of a right veteran, there,” William Boswick commented. “Not like some of the greenhorns been arriving here as of late…”

“I’ve had my share of fights,” Alasdair said. 

“Well, I can always appreciate a good fighter, aha,” Boswick chuckled. “My own father, bless his dead soul, was a frontliner for the armies of Tenarum back in the day.”

“You a Tenarite, then?”

“Like hell I am,” Boswick said, chortling. “I left that awful realm as soon as I could. Spent some time up in Daerum.”

“Daerum’s a shithole, too,” Alasdair said. 

“Yeah, well, it’s a better shithole. And they brew better up there, too,” Boswick said with a wink. He led Alasdair back into the forge area, where the temperature was even higher. Gaudy flames crackled from lively stone furnaces, and in the far corner next to some freshly assembled weaponry stood two familiar figures, speaking to one another in voices inaudible over the peal of the bellows. 

“So what’re you lookin’ for, lad?” Boswick asked, virtually shouting over the roar. “New weapon? Need maintenance? Seeking a change of pace?”

Alasdair pulled out his axe and set it on top of the nearest barrel, pointing to the blade as he did so.

“Ah, a little ol’ chip,” Boswick said. “I can fix that up in a jiff.”

“How much?”

“Ten silver.”

_ Well, you drive a hard bargain, you fat little bastard.  _ Alasdair delivered the promised coin and let the man take his axe. He was about to mention his cuirass, which remained splintered where the musket ball had entered his body so many weeks ago, but he decided it wasn’t worthwhile. The hole was small and the price was too high. 

_ If someone manages to put a blade through that hole, I commend them for their accuracy.  _ He was so caught up in his own thoughts that he barely registered the two men approaching him. 

“Battle damage, huh?”

Dismas chose to lean over a nearby barrel, chewing on something, while Reynauld stood up straight. Both men looked tired and a little buzzed, and Alasdair suspected they had been drinking their fair share at the tavern. 

“Just a chip,” Alasdair replied to Dismas. 

“Did you hit a helmet?”

“No, it was the scratchers.”

Dismas visibly winced a little when he mentioned the scratchers.  _ Maybe Sigrid was right, and it wasn’t just some bullshit story.  _ The thought mildly amused him. 

“Well, by the sound of it, you did pretty well for yourself,” Reynauld said. 

“We caught the musketeer as she was coming back from the chirurgeon’s ward,” Dismas said. “She was all over you.”

“Extolling your bravery, by the sound of it,” said Reynauld. 

“Well-”

“Hey, the weald can be a rough place,” Reynauld said. “If you got compliments, you’ve earned them.”

“You came back in one piece,” Dismas observed. “If you’d like a round of applause for that, you deserve it.”

Reynauld spoke with sincerity. Dismas, not so much. But in his short time at Tauros, he had come to expect nothing more from the highwayman, who seemed to enjoy irritating others. 

“Dismas,” Reynauld said, speaking like a parent would to a child. “Don’t be a dick.”

“Oh, come, I was being genuine,” Dismas protested. 

“No you weren’t.”

“The weald is no joke,” Dismas continued. “Remember what happened the last time we went out there?”

“Yeah, we found Alasdair. And you were looting his backpack.”

Dismas flashed a wry smile at Alasdair, as if to say  _ nothing personal, buddy.  _

“Yeah, but the joke was on you,” Alasdair said. 

“Joke was on me,” Dismas admitted, holding his hands up as if to say  _ you got me _ . “I should know that the only thing of value a bounty hunter carries is paper.”

Alasdair grunted. He would say nothing to that.  _ Thankfully he has no idea what the paper I have now says. He’d cream his pants if he knew the reward he could get.  _

“We’re glad to have your sword-arm here, though,” Reynauld said, when Alasdair had no comment. “We really are.”

“All the recent greenhorns are glory-seekers,” Dismas spat, “and I hate glory-seekers.”

“Coming from a man who came here for the promise of coin-”

“Hey, I never said I loved myself,” Dismas said, grinning devilishly. He looked from Reynauld to Alasdair, and then chuckled at himself. 

Boswick returned a moment later with the axe, its blade honed once more, and an offer to visit him  _ whenever _ . Alasdair bid farewell to them and stepped outside, standing in the threshold for a moment as he decided whether or not to brave the pouring rain. 

_ May as well,  _ he thought to himself.  _ I will see much worse in my time here. If there were any other place in the world… _

He stepped out into the street as the rain pounded the cobblestones relentlessly. 


	7. The Stranger

“Oooh, tough luck, friend.”

Alasdair swept all of Dismas’ silver up before he could even protest. When Dismas swore aloud, Alasdair pointed to the highwayman’s cards, and then to his. 

“You should’ve folded,” Alasdair chided him. 

“What the fuck?”

“Like I said,” Alasdair repeated. “Should’ve folded.”

“Well, you’re paying for the next round of drinks,” Dismas grumbled. 

“Gladly,” Alasdair agreed. “It  _ is  _ your silver, after all.”

“You cheated.”

“A bounty hunter never cheats,” Alasdair said. 

“That’s like saying a woman never fakes it.”

They both shared a laugh over that one, as lowbrow as it was. Dismas was fairly tolerable after a few drinks were in his system; it had taken him forever to come around to the idea of joining Alasdair in the tavern for a decent night out, but Reynauld had managed to convince him to come along in spite of his reservations.

_ And he seems to have no regret about it _ , Alasdair thought, as Dismas cracked another dirty joke and rewarded himself with a bout of laughter at his own attempt at humor. 

The tavern was mellow but far from empty. Most of those who were assembled at the bar or surrounding tables were clearly mercenaries or adventurers, dressed in all manner of garb and armor and coming from all corners of the North. Those who could afford to drink, or who had simply resigned themselves to being interminably indebted to the tavernkeep, drowned themselves in their mugs, using drink as a salve for their troubled minds. A few had ordered food, as meagre as it might be, and engaged with their meals while making small talk. 

_ The place is certainly more lively than it was during my last visit,  _ Alasdair noted.  _ That’s a good sign. Something to smile about.  _ Reynauld, barely recognizable when out of his chainmail and hardened leathers, returned from the privy as Dismas counted whatever coins remained in his severely diminished purse. 

“Gentlemen, tonight’s a good night,” Reynauld said gleefully as he returned to his seat. “I say we order another round!”

“Well, Alasdair is buying,” Dismas grumbled.

“What, did he empty you out?”

“Not yet.”

“I wouldn’t go for another round, highwayman,” Alasdair warned him, wagging a cautionary finger playfully. “You’ll bleed yourself dry.”

“I’ll show you,” Dismas threatened, but he set his coin purse aside in spite of his attitude. 

They argued for a short while about what to get, and settled on another round of the Farmer’s Special, really the only ale worth the coin in such a dilapidated establishment. Dismas parted briefly to order their drinks, and Reynauld moved a little closer to Alasdair. 

“So, did you talk to Emilia yesterday?” Reynauld asked, leaning in so he could be heard effectively. 

“Briefly.”

“I assume she’s got work for you?”

“Aye, back out in the weald, but she didn’t say anything else.”

“Hmm.”

A moment of silence. One of the parties in the far corner of the tavern burst out laughing, a chorus of sound Alasdair had not heard in some time.

“There’s something stirring in the weald, for sure,” Alasdair said. 

“Another party went out there a few days ago and nearly lost one of their scouts to an infected wound,” Reynauld reported.

“Scratchers?”

“Apparently so,” Reynauld said. “There are a lot of them, but they encountered something else, too.”

Alasdair felt his heart skip a beat. He leaned in more closely, as the laughter gained in volume.

“What did they say?” he asked. 

“I didn’t catch a whole lot, I-”

“Did they mention anything about a woman?”

“Something like that, yeah,” Reynauld replied, looking bemused. “A woman, but...they mentioned she wasn’t quite human. Hunchbacked, gaunt, didn’t seem completely sane…”

Alasdair felt sweat beading on his forehead. Such a familiar scenario, he could almost conjure an image of it right before his eyes. 

_ That old crone...her incantations...could it have been a similar creature? The same one? Who fucking knows anymore. It’s all wrong.  _

“You okay, Alasdair?”

Reynauld grimaced and the creases on his forehead grew more pronounced.

“Yeah, I’m good,” he said, and then leaning in, “It’s all too familiar.”

“What?”

“The reports. The woman...the way they described her...could it be?”

Reynauld had no response. At that moment, Dismas returned with the drinks, and all talk of crones and eldritch fears were forgotten as they indulged in another round of the Farmer’s Special, courtesy of whatever poor bastard had to brew in a rat’s nest like this. 

“Well, gentlemen, what are we drinking to tonight?” Dismas asked, eagerly launching himself at his own mug. 

“Let’s drink to Lady Lancette!” Reynauld suggested, raising his mug high.

“Eh, not her,” Dismas swatted him away. 

“Oh, Dismas,” Reynauld clucked. “There you go again, being a buzzkill.”

“Come on now, Reynauld, you don’t like her, do you?”

“She’s a respectable noblewoman and she’s got a good heart. She’s a true follower of the Light.”

“I think you need a few more drinks, mate,” Dismas said, chortling.

“I’m with Reynauld on this one,” Alasdair said. “She did me a good turn.”

“For real, bounty hunter?”

“I don’t cheat, and I don’t lie,” Alasdair said, with a grin.

“First you take my coin, then you turn on me,” Dismas grumbled. “Insult to injury. Salt in the fucking wound!”

They all clinked their mugs together, though, and drank deeply from the local draught without further ado. It was abnormally bitter, but tolerable as far as tavern ale went. When Alasdair set his mug back down on the table, he noticed that two newcomers had approached them, standing awkwardly at Dismas’ right side. 

_ Better announce yourselves, lads, before that jumpy thief sticks a hole in one of you _ , he thought. In fact, when one of them began speaking, Dismas damn near jumped out of his chair, a sight that amused Alasdair to no end. 

“Begging your pardon, mates,” said a man with gaunt cheekbones, a wispy mustache, and curly brown hair, “But could you spare a couple of chairs for my companion and I?”

At his side stood a strangely-dressed man of darker complexion, with a nearly shaved head and a thick black mustache. He clutched what appeared to be a book - _who reads in a damn tavern, of all places?_ , Alasdair thought - and his shoes were strange creations of felt and leather that were like nothing Alasdair had ever seen before. Hell, nothing the man wore he had seen before. 

None of them answered immediately. Dismas swore under his breath as he righted himself, and Alasdair looked over at Reynauld, who finally decided to make a move.

“Of course, of course,” Reynauld said. “Spare chairs for you gentlemen.”

The two sat at the table and immediately the curly-haired man introduced himself.

“My name is Maurice,” the curly-haired man said. “Maurice the Strong, some call me, but...well, not everyone. Just some. Some  _ do  _ call me that, but...just some, yeah.”

_ Oh god, he’s a nobleman. Or he sounds like a nobleman. This isn’t going to go well _ , Alasdair thought, but he kept his mouth shut and, better yet, kept it full with another swig of ale. 

“Maurice the Strong, huh,” Dismas said, in an almost mockingly lilting tone. 

“And this is my companion, Herod,” Maurice said, motioning to the other man, who said nothing but nodded at all three of them in turn, as his unique way of greeting. 

_ Queer kind of guy. Wonder what brought these two together. Dumb chance, probably.  _

“How’d you two meet?” Reynauld inquired. 

“We overnighted at Hawk’s Nest, and decided it would be best to travel together, instead of going separately,” Maurice replied. 

“The Old Road is quite a dangerous route to be taking,” Reynauld said. 

“Yeah, our friend here knows a lot about that,” Dismas added. Alasdair had nothing to give him but a brief, sharp glare. 

“Aye, but it’s the only way to get here,” Maurice said. 

“Run into any trouble?” 

“Oh, a bit,” Maurice admitted. “We got into a scratch. Herod and I fought our way out of it, though!”

“I stabbed a man and gutted him,” Herod spoke, his first words at the table. He added nothing to that.

_ Fucking cold.  _

“It was a good fight!” Maurice said. Herod had nothing to add to that, either. He was a quiet sort, but the dangerously quiet kind. Alasdair could sense it.

“Any fight is a good fight if you win it,” Dismas interjected. Nobody was paying him any mind, though.  _ Good. Maybe it’ll give him a little lesson in humility, if our card game earlier could not.  _

“Well, welcome to you,” Reynauld said. “Newcomers are always needed here.”

“So we heard. I, uh, come from Amalsium. Heard of it?”

“Yeah, I know. Little duchy on the coast. Pleasant in the summer-” Alasdair meant to continue but was quickly cut off. 

“And not so pleasant in the winter. Like all of the North, really,” Maurice said. “Anyway, word is starting to spread there, too. People talk of Tauros in the taverns. Hushed voices, yes, but there’s talk.”

“What kind of talk?” Alasdair asked.

“Just simple words. They know of this place. They have some inkling of what’s going on here. But...little else,” Maurice replied.

_ That’s a shame. People deserve to know what kind of shit is happening here.  _

“I’m sure they have an inkling, but they need more than that,” Reynauld said. 

“The situation sounded dire. The way the lads in Hawk’s Nest speak of it, it’s hell come to earth, and the land is wreathed in fire,” Maurice said. 

“The  _ lads  _ in Hawk’s Nest don’t know shit,” Dismas cursed. “Just because they’re the closest settlement and they’re on the edge of the Watching Wood doesn’t mean anything at all.”

“Strange things have been happening there, too,” Maurice replied. “The woods creak and groan in odd ways and a foul smell can be caught on the air on the windiest of days.”

“The weald spreads,” Reynauld muttered.

Alasdair couldn’t help but feel something in his stomach involuntarily tighten up at the mere prospect of that. Maurice didn’t seem to understand the gravity of such a situation, but Herod nodded gravely, as though he could comprehend.

_ The guy is strange. But he looks...almost approachable? I don’t fear him...doesn’t mean it’s worth trusting him, though.  _ He kept his eye on Herod’s body language and endlessly shifting eyes as the conversation proceeded.

“How was the road?” Dismas asked. 

“Quiet, other than the ambush. The closer we got to Tauros, the louder the nights grew,” Maurice said. 

“On the darkest of nights, the creatures shriek the loudest,” Dismas said. 

“The people we stayed with at the western end of the wood, they tell the most terrifying tales,” Maurice said.

“As always,” said Reynauld.

“They speak of winged beasts greater than any man, and walking bones with blades as sharp as a razor!” Maurice reported.

“Oh?” Reynauld humored him.

“Aye, and creatures of ferocious nature, predators of the most vicious types, and hateful guardians of the deepest glens-”

“And did you see any of these things?” Reynauld asked.

Maurice hesitated, his cheeks flushing. He stammered, but caught himself before he tripped over his own words.

“We didn’t see any of them, of course. The stories we heard at Hawk’s Nest, though…”

“The stories barely start to touch upon the truth,” Herod muttered. 

“Agreed,” Reynauld added.

“Murmurings of fools, they are,” Herod said, and then fell silent again, looking down at some item that he was toying with in his lap. From his angle, Alasdair could not see what it was, but it looked small, like some kind of trinket or coin. 

“Well, most of them have never even been to Tauros, so I suppose-”

“Our lad Alasdair here has seen his fair share of the weald, already,” Dismas said. 

“I damn near died out there, too,” Alasdair added.

“Oh?” Maurice said, one eyebrow rising up to express a tinge of curiosity. For reasons unknown, it irritated Alasdair to a surprising degree.

“Bandit ambush, like yours,” Alasdair said. Herod was still playing with the item in his lap. Alasdair  _ wanted  _ to know what it is, but he couldn’t find a good angle for a proper visual. 

“But he almost bit it,” Dismas added. 

“Didn’t help that you were scavenging through his backpack,” Reynauld said, taunting Dismas. Dismas had no response to that. 

“Poor soul,” Maurice said. 

_ I don’t need your pity, shoreman. Spare it for your own soul.  _

“You’ll be going back out there, though,” Reynauld said, patting him on the back in an oddly paternal manner. 

“A drink for the brave Alasdair!” Dismas cawed. Though he was clearly being mocked, Alasdair drank anyway. He needed some more of it, as bitter as it was; it was warm, and hearty, and made him feel the least bit like he was at home. 

He noticed Herod perk up, and their eyes met. Herod’s were, as expected, dark brown and full of mystery, churning with curiosity and anxiety in equal measure, as though he were thinking of a question to ask but could not bring himself to it. Alasdair liked to pride himself on his ability to read men and their thoughts just by looking into their iris and seeing their reaction; this one was nervous, but relaxed at the same time. It was a curious combination that gave him pause, and when he realized he had been staring at Herod for a good five seconds he broke contact and took another swig, as Dismas cheered his enthusiasm. 

“This round was on Alasdair,” Dismas grunted as he set his mug down and belched contentedly. “And what about the next one, good buddy?”

“On you, I’m afraid,” Alasdair informed him, rising from his seat. “I will grab some fresh air.”

“The air’s not so fresh here, begging your pardon,” Dismas replied. 

“At least there’s wind, and it won’t stink of man,” Alasdair said, before leaving Dismas to his own devices. He did need to clear his head a little, but he was also becoming uncomfortable with their new guests. Maurice’s indefatigable attitude was irritating and Herod’s abnormal behavior was unnerving. He wanted clearance, clarity, some kind of relief from the constant twinge of nerves. A step outside, even if the air smelled faintly like the nightmarish weald, would be welcome.

He pushed past two drunkards, who were so tossed they could barely hold their ground, and stepped outside, taking a seat on a rusted bucket by one of the tavern windows and looking up at the night sky. 

_ No stars. Just clouds. Laying upon us like a blanket, suffocating. How dismal.  _

The tavern door opened and someone approached him. Alasdair decided to give him a few moments and see if he was a curious and impetuous drunk who would simply walk away. He did not. 

“Oh. It’s you.”

Alasdair looked up to see Herod standing beside him. His hands were clasped in front of the belt buckle holding up his strange robes, and though his face was shrouded in darkness, Alasdair could tell that he was looking down at him.

“You said something about the weald, and you going out there,” Herod said. 

“Well, actually, that was Rey-”

“I want to join you out there.”

Alasdair paused, thinking the words over.

“No.”

“You haven’t heard my full offer,” Herod said. 

“I don’t even know you,” Alasdair countered. “Why should I trust you? With  _ anything _ ?”

“Because I know things.”

“Well, so do I.”

“Maurice will tell his stories,” Herod said. “Everyone will. But I know the truth. I have seen things, even if only glimpses. I understand what’s out there, but there is much yet beyond my comprehension.”

Alasdair frowned but had nothing to respond with. He allowed the stranger to continue, curious in spite of his initial consternation. 

“I know what lies out there, even if I have not yet seen it. I have sensed it. I have sensed the women, too-”

“What do you mean?” 

Alasdair rose and became level with Herod. The two men were about the same height, and of the same build, except Alasdair’s shoulders were broader and had likely seen more conflict in their time.

“The crones?”

“Aye, the crones,” Alasdair sighed. “You know them?”

“I know only a sensation. I can feel them, tapping into powers buried here that have long gone untouched by men.”

“You somehow manage to make this place sound even more repulsive,” Alasdair said, attempting a joke. Herod, for all of his silence, was not amused.

“There is great power buried here. Antediluvian and devoid of place or time. You cannot understand it, but you can understand its lesser manifestations.”

“Like the crones?”

“If that is what you call them,” Herod said, and Alasdair noticed that he was rolling his fingers around his knuckles idly, as if playing with them. 

“I know not what they look like, but I can sense them. Retched, ragged, and-”

“Evil.”

They spoke at the same time.  _ We could only say the same thing. It’s the only word I can think of for them.  _

“Let me enter the forest with you. There is much I have yet to learn,” said Herod. 

“This place is a battlefield, not a library.”

“I have killed before,” Herod protested. “I will kill again.”

“You are just a professor,” Alasdair scoffed, finding his arguments harder and harder to rebuff.

“I teach only myself. And the things I learn can be turned into weapons.”

“And you never told me why I should trust you,” Alasdair said.

“Because when the dead walk, you must trust the living.”

Herod seemed satisfied with his response, as he crossed his arms and waited for Alasdair’s rebuttal. A few drunks stumbled out of the tavern behind him, chortling on about something inane, and Alasdair tried his hardest to block them out and think.

_ That’s not necessarily true...but what do we stand to lose, here?  _

_ Come to think of it, quite a bit. _

“Okay,” Alasdair relented. “Come with me tomorrow morning. I’m going to bring you to the Baroness here and let you speak to her.”

“If you just-”

“She is the only one who can decide these things,” Alasdair cut him off. “I can do no such thing.”

Herod looked primed to continue arguing, but he backed down with a curt “Very well.”

“Eight o’clock sharp. In the keep. Be prompt. You may get what you wish.”

And with that, he headed for home.

* * *

 

Smoke rose from the edge of the weald the next morning. Even from a few miles away, in the center of town, it could be seen. When Alasdair consulted a local about the source of the pollution, he was told “they’re keeping it away”. He assumed the worst, naturally.

The roads were, as usual, fairly empty. A few peasants passed him on the way to the keep, hauling their wares into town in carts or on their burdened backs. None of them made eye contact with him; they were too timid, too subdued, and he was a man on a mission anyway. 

_ No time for idle chit-chat. I’ve got some questions to be answered. Problems to be...solved, to say the least.  _

Herod would hopefully not be waiting for him. All the way down, he was hoping that the man had slept in late, or had decided against his chosen course of action. But lo and behold, there he stood at the gates to the keep, bickering with one of the guardsmen in front of the closed portcullis. 

_ Damn it all. He actually did it.  _

“I’m telling you, I’m here on official bu-”

“Then show me a letter or something,” the guard demanded, his voice rising. 

“Do I look like a common thief to you?”

“You look like a fucking faggot, actually,” the guard replied, and Herod glared at him sharply. 

_ It’s not going anywhere good. I might as well intervene...though I can’t think of a good reason why.  _ Bracing himself for a confrontation, Alasdair crossed the worn cobblestone street before him and approached the arguing pair. The sentries above, more hawkish than usual, were watching the scene as though it was a play staged for their entertainment. 

“I’ll have you know-”

“Hey, mate,” Alasdair called out, and both of them turned their heads towards him. “Leave off, he’s with me.”

“He doesn’t have any documentation on him,” the guard said. 

“Well, it was a mistake. Formalities, formalities,” Alasdair said, and attempted a wry grin. The guardsman did not looked pleased but he disengaged from Herod and gave the order for the men above, now deprived of their entertainment, to raise the gate and allow them to enter.

“He ought to have documentation of some sort,” the guard protested. 

“I didn’t have any of that when I came here,” Alasdair replied.

“It’s something new.”

“Well, my apologies. We’ll be sure to abide by that next time,” Alasdair promised, already growing irritated. But the gate began to rise up, the iron squealing as it passed through its lodgings, and they were admitted into the keep. 

“Just doing my job,” the guard grumbled, as they passed into the courtyard and the gate began to come down behind them. 

“That’s news to me. Documentation my ass,” Alasdair grumbled when they were out of earshot.

“He was giving me hell for it,” Herod complained. “Thanks for coming along, I-”

“Don’t be thanking me. Let’s just get this over with.”

Herod did not protest and meekly followed Alasdair into the main building, which was once again oppressively quiet and fetid with the stench of mildew, as though water had started to wreak havoc on the structure. 

_ This whole town is a mess,  _ Alasdair thought,  _ except for the tavern. The tavern’s pretty alright.  _

“Have you met Lady Lancette before?”

“A few times,” Alasdair replied. “She insists we call her Emilia.”

“Oddly friendly, for a noblewoman.”

“That I can agree with.”

Emilia was nowhere to be found in the main hall, but the couple of bored-looking guardsmen who were manning the place promised they would send back for her and she would be available as soon as she could. Herod and Alasdair stood in the centre of the room, just shy of the elevated dais where Emilia usually sat and worked, and awkwardly attempted to make small talk. It took a few long, painfully drawn-out minutes before Emilia showed up and took her seat, as usual, to speak with them. 

“Alasdair. Good morning. And you are?”

“My name is Herod.”

“Superb,” Emilia said.“You’re a strange looking type, too.”

“Many people say that.”

“I assume you’ve come to aid our cause?”

“Why else?”

Herod’s dry response stymied her briefly. She wasn’t expecting someone as curt and forthright as he was. 

“You would not be the first,” she informed him dryly. 

“I’ve come because I believe I understand something about what’s going on here,” Herod added. Now that,  _ that  _ was something different. Alasdair could sense a change in Emilia’s posture, and her attitude. She was intrigued now, whereas she had been almost bored before.

“You think so?”

“I’ve studied these things. The occult, the eldritch, the cosmic...only an inkling, perhaps, but I’ve dipped my toe in the metaphorical pool,” Herod said. 

“And what have you learned?” Emilia asked.

“Terrible things.”

“Terrible?”

“And I wish to know more.”

Alasdair wasn’t sure if he was in the presence of a brave man, or a mad man. The strange robes and garb certainly lent themselves to the image of a mad man, and yet...he seemed and sounded composed, and stood with his back as straight as a spear. 

_ He wants to be taken seriously. Part of me is tempted to do so. He knew about the crones...what else does he know?  _

“You are not the first one to come to me about such things,” Emilia said, leaning forward and scrutinizing them both with an unfamiliar intensity. 

“I imagine.”

“Many of them tried to sell me snake oil,” Emilia said. “Both figuratively and literally.”

“I promise you that is not my intention,” said Herod. 

“I sent many home. Will I be sending you home, too? Or will I be sending you to a jail cell, instead?” Emilia asked.

_ Little harsh, dear. Even for a weird guy like him _ , Alasdair thought, but for the moment he kept quiet. 

“I can prove myself to you,” Herod promised.

“They all said that too.”

“Give me the chance. I did not come all this way to be rebuffed like such,” Herod said. 

“You understand, sir Herod,” Emilia said, “that I have many enemies and few friends. I cannot afford such open trust. If I had my-”

“May I speak, Lady Lancette?”

She immediately fell silent and turned to Alasdair, who had decided that now was the right time to speak.  _ Now or never. You owe me for this, stranger.  _

“I told you to call me Emilia,” she said brusquely.

“Emilia. My apologies.”

“Speak, then.”

“I believe this man,” Alasdair said.

“And why?”

“He knows things,” Alasdair began, and wondered how to continue properly. “He knows things...that he shouldn’t. But in a good way.”

Emilia cocked her head, indicating that she was listening. That was the sign to go on.

“He knew about the scratchers. He knew about the crone, too, the old wizened creature in the weald...without ever seeing them with his own eyes, but he knew…”

“The powers I am capable of tapping into are broad as well as deep,” Herod said. “They give me much.”

“I didn’t believe him too, at first, but he has seen the creatures. Felt some of them, too. I believe he may have much to yield to us.”

Alasdair finished with that. He received an approving nod from Herod, who looked visibly relieved after his thorough interrogation earlier. 

“I appreciate your words, Alasdair,” she said. “You make a sound argument.”

“With all due respect, Lad-Emilia, I met this man only yesterday but I am convinced of his utility. And...well, while I do not trust him fully, I believe he has come here for the same reasons as Reynauld, Dismas, and I did. To fight.”

Emilia sighed deeply, clearly mulling over the potential courses of action in her head. She finally relented, moved by their arguments, and deigned to put her trust in Herod so long as he could prove himself both in town, and on the battlefield.

“I promise to do my utmost for you and your warriors,” Herod said. 

“I apologize for putting you in such a predicament like that,” Emilia said. “I have had...less than agreeable visitors, as of late, and I feared you were another one of those.”

“Is that why your guards are asking for documentation, now?” Alasdair ventured.

“I’m afraid so, yes.”

“I cannot-”

“It’s a sticky situation so I must do what I think is necessary,” Emilia said, interrupting him and pushing the issue to the side. “But for now, you both have my blessings. Of course, Alasdair...you already did. So I suppose it is only you, my occultist friend, who requires my blessings.”

“I’d be honored to accept,” Herod avowed. 

“I’ll be sure to inform the guards. But I request something in return,” said Emilia.

_ Well go on. Don’t hold us in suspense.  _

“Your resources may be invaluable. I ask that you accompany a team of explorers on their next expedition into the weald.”

_ Fuck. I didn’t even have to bring that up. She already had it in mind. Serves me right for telling her I was willing to go back out there… _

“It would be an honor,” Herod said.

“Alasdair here is one of that party,” Emilia said. “But you likely have not met the others I intend to dispatch.”

“I will certainly make friends with them,” Herod promised.

_ Not with Sigrid, you won’t. Better watch your cock, mate, or she’ll pry it right off.  _

“Alasdair will acquaint you with the weald, though you will quickly learn to watch your step out there,” she said. 

“He’ll stick with us. Just give us the information and we’ll handle it from there,” Alasdair said. 

“I’ve gone over your reports from the last expedition and I believe more surveyal and scouting is in order,” she said. “Can you map?”

“I think Sigrid would be better at that. But it can be a joint effort,” Alasdair said.

“A map would be invaluable for future operations. I know it’s not a perfect tool, but it’s better than going in blind,” Emilia said. She swiveled to Herod, now.

“And you,” she said, speaking now to him, “I want you to write. Record observations. Take notes. Are you a scientist?”

“I feel as though any scientific community would likely ostracize me,” Herod admitted.

_ Well, everyone is their own worst critic. But have some self-esteem.  _

“Doesn’t matter. You might prove yourself worthy of this town yet,” she brushed him off. 

“I will do what I can,” Herod promised. “The unknown things cloak themselves in shadows. They do not like to make their shapes and thoughts known.”

“Well, you’re going to know them,” she said. No conditions. Then she turned back to Alasdair.

“And Alasdair?”

_ Yes ma’am _ ? Alasdair made eye contact so she knew he was listening.

“You take care of him out there. Find Cordelia and Sigrid. Give them this information. I will have a letter to you tonight. Take them out there. No more than one day out in those woods. And be careful.”

“Understood.”

And so they were dismissed. Alasdair took note of the guards watching them as they departed the keep, even though they had admitted them in previously.  _ Something’s fishy. Who is she watching out for? And why?  _ Naturally, he was not about to go back in and ask, but he wanted to know. It was an itch he had to scratch, so to speak, and it was growing more irritable with each passing minute.

“I never really volunteered for these things, either,” Alasdair told him as they walked. “I was volun-told, more like.”

“She sounds confident in you,” said Herod. 

“I’ve been out there once,” Alasdair said. “And honestly, once would be enough without the pay.”

“The pay sounds decent,” Herod said. 

“More money than you could make in a year in most crafts,” Alasdair said.

“Lady Lancette is old money. But she does not speak like it,” Herod noted. 

“She was strange today, though. She didn’t come off as her usual self. Something is bothering her.”

“You should’ve asked,” Herod said.

_ But you don’t ask those kinds of things _ , he thought.  _ You let them make themselves evident. Sooner or later, they will. You just wait and watch.  _

_ Funny, because that’s now your job _ , he thought again, as they continued in silence.  _ That’s...yeah. Better buy a book, stranger. You are going to have a lot to say.  _


	8. The Prize

_ It’ll be just like before. Get in, spend a night at camp- _

_ -oh, and be sure to pick a good spot, just remember that- _

_ -and then return as quickly as possible. In, and out. That’s what she said, right?  _

“Well, Alasdair? Are you going in, or what?”

Sigrid was right behind him, impatiently nudging him in the back with her bony elbow. Standing on the edge of the weald, faced with darkness and a tangled mess of thickets and foliage in front of him, he almost wanted to say  _ no. No way.  _

But he forged on ahead, stepping over a particularly gnarly thorn bush and making his way into the woods.

“Just thinking about the best way to go about this,” Alasdair informed her.

“Same as before. Stick to the paths, and we should be able to get to our same campsite again,” Sigrid said. 

_ Ideally, yes. But no plan survives contact with the enemy. _

That was something he had learned the hard way. But there was no sense in fretting now; even in the weald, the air seemed clearer and the sunlight had managed to penetrate some of the thinner parts of the canopy, enlightening the normally umbrous turf of the forest. He was already feeling more confident about this expedition, though he reminded himself of how quickly the tide can turn. 

Cordelia had opted to take up the rearguard position and watch over Norr and Herod, the former of the two quickly bailed out of his dungeon cell to act as a guide of sorts for the weald. 

_ Owing to me, of course _ .  _ If it had been up to Sigrid he would have starved to death down in that pit.  _ She had not been too pleased with the decision, unsurprisingly, but Emilia had approved of it and had appreciated Alasdair’s commitment to helping the bandit, as she put it, “turn a new leaf”. Sigrid wasn’t convinced but there was no protest she could commit to that would change the course of affairs, so she had taken to marching in glum silence and occasionally lashing out at someone else in the group when they did something displeasing.

“I want to know which one of you bastards signed me up for this,” Sigrid grumbled, as if to prove his point.

“Emilia decided you would make an excellent mapper!” Cordelia chimed in from the back.

_ Nice one,  _ Alasdair thought, as Sigrid fell silent again.  _ There’s no way she can complain about that. Not unless she wants to go without pay.  _

“I know the most traveled trails here, but only by heart,” Norr said. “I’m afraid none of us ever decided to put it on paper.”

“Well, let’s hope your memory serves you well,” Sigrid muttered. 

Nobody responded to her comment, of course.  _ Nobody wants to feed her attitude. Let her sulk. She  _ will  _ get over it. _

They found the main trail and proceeded, as Sigrid glumly pulled out the cartography equipment she had been provided and began sketching a rough map of the area based on their starting location. As Alasdair watched her note and scribble on her pad, he wondered if they were actually doing anything productive.  _ Her mapmaking skills are...mediocre, at best. Then again, I couldn’t do much better. I’d probably give up ten minutes into the job.  _

Norr moved up past Sigrid while she was busy scrutinizing her drawings and sidled up to Alasdair’s side as they continued to move. 

“So, bounty hunter?” Norr said. 

“How’d you figure that one out?”

“I pick up on things.”

_ Yeah, so do I, pal. It comes with the job.  _

“Who brought you here, then?” Norr asked. 

_ God, why do they always ask that question?  _

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Alasdair retorted. 

“That’s...kind of why I asked,” Norr said, frowning.

“Something tells me you’ve never met a real bounty hunter before,” Alasdair said. 

“No, actually,” Norr said. “That’s because the ones who come looking for me, generally want me dead.”

“Yeah, taking a man alive is surprisingly difficult.”

“Yeah, that makes sense...”

Norr gave up after that, and thankfully he gave up quickly.

_ Never ask a bounty hunter about his bounty. That’s a one-way ticket to losing his trust.  _ It was pretty common; only an amateur bounty hunter would dare reveal critical information about his quarry and his whereabouts to a stranger. The business was a cutthroat one, understandably so, and to put such information on the line was to risk not only your bounty but your life as well.

_ Some men are desperate. They’ll slit your throat and steal your blade in the night if they think it will give them a leg up on everyone else.  _

“This place is more foreboding than it looked from the road,” Herod commented. He seemed pretty  _ blasé  _ about the whole adventure so far, and Alasdair had previously seen him bending down along the trail to examine plants or strange fungi and take notes on them.  _ Doing his job well, I suppose.  _

“The Road doesn’t do it justice. You have to get in to really see it,” Alasdair replied.

“Yeah, try living here,” Norr said. 

“No thanks.”

“We managed to find some good camping spots and even had strongholds set up. But they were never in the deepest parts of the forest,” he continued. 

“I wonder why.” 

All the while, Sigrid and Cordelia were quiet. Cordelia was simply keeping her eyes peeled and gripping her musket tight. The weald obviously unnerved her, though it had that effect on most everybody. Sigrid, however, was still in a poor mood. Alasdair wondered when it would lift, or if she was going to trouble the rest of them for the entire journey. 

“How do you manage to live in a place as unwholesome as this?” Herod asked. 

“We make do,” Norr said, shrugging. “There’s firewood. There’s some foragable food, animals still to hunt. If you find high ground it’s the best place to try and hole up.”

“And the monsters?”

“They do trouble us,” Norr admitted. 

“How many of you are there?” Alasdair asked.

“Pardon?”

“Of you, all of you...bandits, brigands, whatever you folk call yourselves.”

“Well, we don’t all gather in one group,” Norr corrected him. “There’s many groups. We’re not as organized as you may want to think.”

“That is curious. How many groups?”

“I don’t know, mate. I really don’t,” Norr admitted. “I stuck with my guys and they stuck with me. We didn’t swear no oaths or anything. We just tried our best to survive in the wilderness.”

“Well, you seemed like you all were doing pretty well,” Alasdair said. 

“Yeah, ‘till you all came along.”

_ Yes, and I have no regrets about that. Don’t give me any, either.  _

The first incident occurred not long after they fell silent once more. Alasdair spotted something up ahead, and signaled the others to keep low and wait back a bit for him to examine it. Handing the torch back to Sigrid, who was still as annoyed as ever, he carefully approached the scene, where the bloodied, tattered corpses of two fungal scratchers could be seen lying on the forest floor, their injuries still fresh.

“Axes and blades,” Alasdair said. “The handiwork of bandits, perhaps.”

“Maybe another party from Tauros?” Cordelia suggested.    
“We would’ve been informed if that were the case,” Sigrid muttered. “Well, we’re not alone in here.”

_ And we never were.  _ Alasdair took a few seconds to examine them for any other remarkable qualities, but they were pretty well hacked to pieces. Whoever had done them in had been sure to do a thorough job.

“We usually try to avoid the zombies,” Norr said, looking perturbed. “They’re tough to fight.”

“As you and I both know,” Alasdair said. “Know anybody with a death wish?”

“Could have just been a desperate man stumbling into the wrong encounter,” Norr said. “Or, someone new to these woods.”

“It’s something. Keep a sharp ear and eye out. I don’t want to be running into an ambush anytime soon,” Alasdair said. Sigrid glanced at him with a look that said  _ who put you in charge? _ , but the rest of them fell back into formation without further ado.

The second incident occurred about three hours later, after a brief lunch was held in a clearing off of the main path. After cleaning up any detritus and checking to make sure their tracks were covered, they were about to set back onto the trail when they heard footsteps coming down the path. Alasdair, in front again, signaled the others to get low in the brush and extinguish the torch. Sigrid quickly put the torch under her foot and hooded Remy, who remained still on her shoulder, as though he sensed the danger and had decided to react accordingly. Norr took Alasdair’s side and Cordelia crouched down behind a sapling on his left side as they waited in the darkness. The footsteps grew louder, but Alasdair did not feel the unnatural chill or smell the foul scent again.

_ These are humans. I can already tell that.  _

His assumptions were confirmed when a group of four men, dressed in thick leathers and furs and bearing blades and spears, passed their hiding place in silence, moving single-file like trained soldiers.

_ Brigands. But better armed and more alert than the ones we’ve encountered before. These men are different.  _

In particular, one of them stood out from the others just by virtue of physical qualities. 

_ It couldn’t be...but he fits the description.  _

A big man...so broad, and carrying himself with the confidence of a bear treading through his hunting grounds…

_ Could it be him? Esteban?  _

The man he was observing in particular was a hulking brute of a human, with shoulders and upper chest as broad as a bear’s and legs like rocks. Wrapped in hides and thick leather he looked well prepared for life in the wilderness, and the long polearm he brandished was no child’s toy. In spite of himself, Alasdair felt a sudden tightening in his chest, and wondered if this would all be worthwhile.

But he remembered the paper in his right-hand pocket, tucked tightly against his thigh.

_ Ten thousand gold pieces. Enough money to sustain a fancy lifestyle for an entire year.  _

_ So yes, worthwhile.  _

“Let me get a closer look,” Alasdair urged, pushing past Norr and sidling up to Sigrid. The latter was not pleased at all to be giving him space, but he used his shoulder to shove her aside so he could see as well as possibly. The bulky figure, though his back was turned to them and he was moving away, was enough of a match for Alasdair to be convinced.

“That’s  _ got  _ to be him,” Alasdair hissed, watching as they vanished around the corner of a massive, twisted oak. 

“How can you be sure?” Sigrid asked. 

“It’s so fitting,” Alasdair said. 

“You can’t even see his face,” Sigrid seethed.

“I’ve got a gut feeling. Sixth sense, you know?” he rebuked her. 

“You have no idea, Alasdair,” Cordelia said, trying to talk some sense into him. But there was no sense to be spoken now. The only language he wanted to hear was the clink of coin, what he had been hunting for all these weeks.

“I’m going to track him. Let’s keep our distance but be sure we stay close enough to remain on their trail,”

“They’re going deeper into the forest, though,” Cordelia said. “That’s not-”

“We can follow them a bit farther, and then break off if we need to.”

“Alasdair, it’s not our job!” Cordelia argued. 

“I don’t give a damn if it’s not!” Alasdair swore, struggling to stay suppressed and quiet. “This is what I came here for.”

“We didn’t come here to hunt,” Cordelia said. 

“Yeah, but I did. And I’m going to get my prize.”

No more waiting. They were already losing valuable time just by bickering. Pushing past Sigrid, who looked about ready to trade blows with him, he stepped off onto the trail and began walking. Making certain to keep his footing light and to check his corners carefully to make sure he hadn’t been spotted, he proceeded down the same path that his potential quarry had gone down.

_ They will follow, or they will not. It does not matter to me. I am on the trail, now. The hunt will be ending soon. Beginning of the end.  _

One by one, like timid children, the others emerged from the brush and followed him, jogging to catch up. He said nothing to them as they fell in line; he had nothing to say.

_ I knew they would follow. They will see, it will be the right decision.  _

Torch in hand, Alasdair led the way forward as they ventured deeper into the weald, the light becoming dimmer with every uncertain step. 

* * *

 

By late afternoon, the light was dimming to the point where one could not see ten feet beyond the edges of the trail. Night was fast approaching, and while they were not far from their previous campsite, they had not anticipated stumbling upon the chapel.

Cordelia was actually the first to spot it. The others were investigating a sound they had heard on the right side of the trail, but Cordelia had eyes ahead and had spotted the clearing before anyone else. After that, everyone was fixated on the strange building ahead. 

As they emerged into the clearing, it was clear that it was a dilapidated chapel, its age and origin unknown. The wooden doors and paneling had rotted and disintegrated into oblivion long ago, but the stone walls and tile roof remained, even if their condition was poor. The mere existence of the vestiges of civilization, this far into the weald, was in and of itself an unexpected surprise. To find an intact building was almost a miracle.

“We could easily set a watch and stay here tonight,” Cordelia suggested. 

“You think so?” Alasdair asked. 

“The high ground would be safer,” Sigrid said. 

“Aye, but we may not make it there before nightfall. We’d be risking it,” Alasdair replied. 

“That’s not a risk I’m willing to take,” Norr put his word in. 

“I don’t trust this place,” Sigrid said. “It’s almost...too convenient.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Norr swore. 

“I don’t want to be caught out on the trail after dark,” Alasdair responded. “Do you?”

“I think we could make it,” Sigrid said.

“And I think you’re overruled.”

Sigrid would not continue, not now that Cordelia and Norr had taken Alasdair’s side. As she begrudgingly moved along with them, they decamped within the old chapel, taking their time investigating its interior and checking for any potential structural damage or holes in the walls. A spot was cleared in the middle of the main room for a camping space, and lots were drawn to choose who would be on watch for the first part of the night. Poor Sigrid drew the short straw, and had no comment about the adverse outcome. 

They ate cold food without a fire. Fires created smoke, and smoke could attract unwanted attention. Though Alasdair was pining for a hot meal, he knew it wouldn’t be worth the potential trouble. So they ate without heat or light, and the darkness grew darker as each minute passed.

“This place is very unnatural,” Herod commented, as they finished their meals and unpacked their beddings. 

“Glad you finally figured that out,” said Sigrid. She was the only one not prepping her bedroll, and she had taken to idly petting Remy and keeping him calm now that she had finished eating. 

“You never really get used to it. But it does get easier every time,” Cordelia assuaged him. 

“I imagine.”

Herod did not seem to be in any particular form of discomfort, but Alasdair had been watching him all day. His shoulders were tensed, he had been walking quickly, and every cracking branch or swishing brush in the woods had caused him to jump a little. He was unfamiliar with the setting and it clearly showed. 

“We’ll take turns on sentry watch,” Alasdair said. “You a light sleeper?”

“I always have been,” Herod replied.

“That’s going to be in your favor, then,” Alasdair said. 

“You can be second, newbie,” Sigrid said. “A crash course in keeping the watch.”

“I will do my best,” Herod promised, unfazed by her attitude. 

Alasdair needed rest. His feet hurt, and he knew he’d be elected for third watch after Herod was finished. He figured it would be best to get some shut-eye before that; after all, the next day might be an even rougher one, if they managed to catch their quarry.

He lay down in his bedroll and forced his eyes to close. Sleep, mercifully, came desultory and pleasant. 

* * *

 

“ _ Up, up! Get up! _ ”

The harsh whispering woke him up but as soon as he sat up to try and make sense of his situation, a frigidly cold hand was clamped over his mouth. His initial fear turned to irritation when he found that it was Sigrid, putting one hand over his mouth and another up to her lips.

_ I got the message. Now get your damn hand off of me.  _

The chapel was bathed in near complete darkness. Barely any light was streaming through the open windows, as the weald had a tendency to consume and digest any light it could receive. But Alasdair could hear noises from outside. Shuffling footsteps, slow and unsteady, as though whoever was out there was stumbling blindly through the darkness, uncertain of their next step. 

_ Scratchers _ , Sigrid mouthed. He understood. He carefully accessed his rucksack and withdrew his axe and dirk, making as little noise as possible. With luck, however many scratchers were out there would move past them quickly and they’d be able to return to sleep. 

“ _ How many do you think there are? _ ” Alasdair whispered, sidling up to Cordelia, who was perched next to a window with her musket loaded and ready. 

“ _ Three or four. I’m not sure, _ ” she replied, her voice thick with tension. Anxiety was understandable; they couldn’t see more than a few feet beyond their faces, and the shuffling outside was getting louder and closer. They might even be outnumbered. 

_ I wouldn’t be using that musket if I were you _ , Alasdair thought, but he didn’t want to say anything. Any sound, any hint of human presence in such a dreadful place, could bring those monstrosities down upon them like flies upon meat. Better to wait, and hope that they would leave.

Alasdair could now see shapes shifting in the darkness, not ten feet away from him. Bulky and tall, they stumbled around in the tall grass outside of the chapel, searching for something...or perhaps just wandering, like the automatons they were. 

_ But what if they’ve somehow sensed us? What if they’re looking for us?  _ He gripped the handle of his axe tighter as one of the creatures gurgled loudly, and stopped in its tracks. He couldn’t see what it was doing, or how many more there were, but the shuffling all of a sudden stopped, and the world outside was, for a few moments, deathly quiet.

_ This isn’t good,  _ he thought.

And, as though a prophecy had sprung to life, everything went to hell.

A massive body began ramming itself into the chapel’s doorway, which had been crudely barricaded with rubble and what little wood could be scavenged before nightfall to ensure security. The shuffling sounds outside gave way to gurgles and groans as the scratchers began attempting to force themselves into the chapel, assaulting the door with bodies and arms. The rotted and dead wood they had used to barricade the doorway gave way in seconds, and as Cordelia lit a torch up they could see their adversaries clearly. There were at least eight scratchers in view, all struggling to get through the doorway, and each of them were as brutish and terrible as the next. Devoid of eyes or any facial features, covered in open sores and fungal growths, they were horrid to behold, but that did not stop the party from springing into action as soon as the first one pushed past the rubble and stepped over the threshold. 

The first scratcher to scramble over the rocks and shattered wood was greeted with Alasdair’s axe, which nearly hewed through the beast’s arm. The force of the strike sent the creature sprawling back against the doorframe, and it struggled to rise again as its allies poured through the doorway, arms outstretched as though reaching for a living being to grab. Remy, unhooded, leapt into action and began lashing out at the creatures as he flew from one to the other, digging claws into their heads and tormenting them as Herod and Norr dove into the frenzy and began hacking away at the monsters. Herod was armed with nothing more than a small curved blade, more akin to a kitchen knife than a battlefield instrument, but he wielded it with grace and energy, digging the cold iron into flesh and muscle and withdrawing it with unexpected ease. 

They would have been butchered if not for Remy. The falcon acted as a thorny distraction, keeping the beasts occupied with his tormenting claws and flapping while the others sliced away at the creatures, cutting them to pieces before they could even react. Cordelia had abandoned her musket in favor of the torch, using the fire to her advantage as she hammered at the scratchers with the wooden pole and attempted to burn them with the flame. Norr was hit once, but it was a glancing blow across his leather hauberk, and he rewarded it with a violent slash that disemboweled his foe and left it writhing on the floor, blood and pus gushing from the open wound. 

As Remy flew back to Sigrid’s shoulder, the last of the scratchers were finished off. None of them had attempted to retreat; being automatons, they had no considerations for their own selves, only considerations for performing their task to its fullest. As such, by the time the brawl had died down, nine scratchers lay dead against the walls or on the floor of the chapel, and another two had been slain outside as Alasdair and Herod had rushed out to eliminate them before they could enter. 

_ No one is injured,  _ Alasdair observed. They were sweaty and exhausted, and Norr had a massive bruise building on his left pectoral, but nobody was bleeding or otherwise hurt. 

_ We got lucky. And we had Remy.  _ The bird had alighted back on Sigrid’s shoulder, visibly invigorated by the bloodshed, and was now trying to resist her as she attempted to replace his hood. 

“How did they find us?” Cordelia asked, exasperated.

“Sheer dumb luck, maybe,” Alasdair suggested, kicking at one of the corpses to ensure it was truly dead. It did not move.

“Or they tracked us,” Sigrid said. 

“They don’t seem to be intelligent enough to do that,” Herod said. 

“Aye, but their masters might be,” Sigrid said. 

“You think it’s something else?” Herod asked. 

“Could be,” Sigrid mused, finally succeeding in hooding her bird. “Could be.”

The torch was quickly extinguished after that, and what rubble could be salvaged was put back in place as a temporary defensive measure. Nobody would sleep that night; no one dared. 


	9. The Hunt

Breakfast that morning was brief and quiet.

They abandoned the chapel and left the doors open, in case anyone ever wished to return. Sigrid marked it on her makeshift map, to ensure that they would be able to return should it be necessary.

Continuing onto a fresh trail, they picked up the footsteps again rather quickly. Clearly belonging to multiple pairs of boots, these footsteps were pretty well-sunken into the loam of the weald, indicating that their owners were making haste.

“Running from something?” Norr wondered, as Alasdair bent down to examine a few of them. 

“Either us, or something else,” Alasdair said.

“You think they know we’re onto them?” Norr asked.

“I don’t think they would know,” Alasdair said. “But we should not assume.”

_ Keep following the footprints. If anything, you may catch them by nightfall, presuming they’re still traceable.  _

The footprints continued. They were moving at a fast pace, it would seem, as though they were fleeing from something and were trying to gain on it. Alasdair decided that it would be wise for their own party to pick up the pace; though Sigrid protested once more, nobody took her side. 

_ I am in charge now. I am the hunter. I will hunt my prize and I will catch him, damn it.  _

It was around ten o’clock in the morning when they heard the first gunshot. Like a clap of thunder, it resounded throughout the weald, a sharp crack like that of a fierce whip. Everyone stopped as soon as they heard it, as though transfixed by the noise itself.

“Esteban,” Alasdair murmured.    
“That wasn’t far away,” Sigrid noted. 

“No. Let’s keep moving,” Alasdair encouraged them, and began to jog down the trail, crunching dessicated leaves and scattered twigs underfoot. Not a minute later, another gunshot rang out, closer now. The footprints, too, were looking fresher.

_ And more scattered. As though their formation began to fall apart here. How close are we?  _

“Alasdair, slow down,” Sigrid encouraged him, but he had no ears or mind for her. She was going to end up holding him back.  _ Stupid. I am not missing out on this.  _

“Take caution,” she urged, but he was throwing caution to the wind. The others were further behind him now, straggling as they began to hesitate. They did not have a prize to tantalize them; they did not have the promise of unimaginable rewards to motivate them onwards. Alasdair did.

The third gunshot was deafening and indicated that their quarry was close. So close, in fact, that Alasdair could hear the sounds of struggle, and a distant, plaintive moaning that could only come from a very familiar kind of abomination. 

“Draw weapons,” Alasdair commanded. Everyone did so, quite eagerly. The sounds of battle were now quite clear, and it was evident that if they continued they would soon be a part of it.

“Do you think we should get off the trail?” Cordelia asked. 

“No. We continue,” Alasdair said.

“We’re walking right into combat,” Sigrid pointed out.    
“As intended.” 

_ Exactly what I want,  _ Alasdair thought.  _ You want to step back now? Go ahead. I’m moving on.  _

He could hear shouts ahead, coming from a clearing in the woods. Whoever it was, bandit or otherwise, they were likely being assailed by the denizens of the weald, determined to defend their domain. Hostile or not, Alasdair would surely pick their side for the time being. But afterwards...afterwards was a different question.

“Do you ever wonder if you’re being impetuous?” Herod asked from behind, struggling to keep up with Norr and Alasdair, who were both in excellent physical shape and were used to rough terrain akin to the turf of the weald.

“I do wonder, yes,” Alasdair replied, picking the pace up even more. 

“Do you ever stop to think about it?” Herod asked.

“Not at all.”

Alasdair burst into the clearing and found that it was swarming with scratchers. At least a dozen of them attempted to claw and slash at a group of humans, most of whom bore polearms and heavy axes and were barely managing to keep the creatures at a distance. The only one of them with a ranged weapon, an ancient-looking blunderbuss, struggled to reload while still moving backwards, retreating from the advancing shamblers.

And then there was the big one. Decked out in heavy leathers and bearing a massive halberd, he stood at the center of his party and shouted orders, directing his comrades to the most advantageous positions and hacking at the scratchers whenever they drew too near. One of the creatures, perhaps a bit more aggressive than its counterparts, drew too close to him and was rewarded with a cleaving blow that decapitated it cleanly. 

_ That has to be him. It has to be.  _

Alasdair was prepared to move in but hesitated when he saw movement in the woods on the outskirts of the clearing. There were more out there, and again he could hear chanting and mumbling streaming from the darkness beyond his eyesight. Whatever was out there was even more sinister than the automatons. 

“Well Alasdair, it’s now or never,” Norr encouraged him, already rushing past him into battle. Alasdair hesitated no longer. Urged into battle, he moved up with Norr and drove his axe into the first scratcher that he encountered, which barely had time to turn around and react to him before its chest caved in from the force of the strike. The creature collapsed and as Norr struck his own blow, some of the monsters disengaged and approached the new foe, sensing danger. Alasdair could see others stumbling out of the woods as well, moving into the light and shambling towards him and Norr. 

_ They were held in reserve. On purpose,  _ Alasdair observed.  _ Someone is guiding them.  _

Alasdair narrowly dodged a swiping arm and stepped to the side as Remy launched himself into the fray. Sigrid remained out of sight, but her bird began to torment and claw at the beasts, going so far as to launch himself at the bandits as well, causing them to swear and yell as the bird ripped at their hoods and exposed faces. All the while, Alasdair kept his eye on Esteban.

_ It’s got to be him. He fits the description.  _

Though he could not see facial features too clearly, he had a sixth sense that taunted him. It  _ had  _ to be him, something in the back of his head repeated, and he would pursue the man until he discovered the truth. 

_ But not right now. There are things in the way.  _

As one of the bandits drove his spear into the back of a scratcher, Alasdair hewed at its head with his axe, creating gashes in its sinewy skin and bringing it to the ground. He paid no heed to the bandits for now; they were already overwhelmed enough as is. More scratchers approached them and managed to tackle the musketeer to the ground, tearing at him with claws. By the time his comrades had reached him and managed to force them away, his chest and neck had been shredded and Alasdair could tell, even from a distance, that he was not long for this world.

He kept his eyes on Esteban. The giant of a man was intent on keeping the creatures at a distance, knocking them back with his halberd whenever they drew into range and keeping his fighters together even as they became overwhelmed. 

The voices from the forest were getting louder. Alasdair could see shapes moving amid the bushes and brambles on the edge of the clearing. Small shapes, familiar, too…

_ Crones _ .

He gripped his axe tighter and stuck close to Norr, who was sparring with a shambler which was attempting to keep its opponent at arm's length. Alasdair sliced its hand off with a clean cut of his axe, and Norr finished it off with a flurry of blows, bashing his sword into it until it collapsed, gurgling and grunting its last. 

“Alasdair! Get down!”

Alasdair asked no questions. He pulled Norr do and fell to the ground as a musket roared. One of the shamblers stumbled backwards, a gaping hole bored into its left shoulder. One of the bandits impaled it with a spear, and its unfortunate life was over. But more were coming, and another bandit was down, bleeding heavily from a shoulder wound and struggling to get back onto his feet. 

_ That could be us soon _ , he knew.  _ If we’re not careful, they’ll overwhelm us too.  _

Already, the bandits were trying to pull out of the clearing and retreat into the woods, towards a new trail. The scratchers threatened to cut them off, though, and Esteban dove into the fray, using his halberd to great effect against the creatures as they attempted to surround the bandit party. The man swung his weapon with all the force of a bear, knocking scratchers to the ground, decapitating them in one fell swoop and making it look effortless the entire time. Alasdair almost started to reconsider his hunt, but they had the advantage, both in numbers and in morale - the bandits were now falling apart.

_ Let’s not lose them, now.  _ They began to retreat, fleeing down the forest path, as more scratchers began to emerge from the forest, their puppeteers not far behind. 

“Let’s move!” Alasdair called.

“Alasdair!” Sigrid said. “We’re being surrounded!”

“We’ve got to keep moving then!” Alasdair cried back. 

“Where are you going?”

“After  _ them _ !”

_ Follow me, or end up like them,  _ Alasdair thought, looking at the dead bandits now lying on the ground, their blood soaking the corrupted soil. He finished off a wounded scratcher, its legs broken and its shoulder ripped to pieces, and began to run after the bandits, who had gotten a head start but were dragging one of their wounded comrades along.

Alasdair picked up the pace. He could hear creatures smashing through the forest around him, now moving faster as their puppeteers commanded them. They were competing now, but he knew they were after him as well. A musket erupted behind him.

_ Cordelia is still alive and well, at least,  _ he knew.  _ I hope no one is hurt.  _

His heart pounded in his head, and he could feel the blood pulsing through his neck and along his jawline. He had no time to stop and catch his breath, even though he was struggling now. They were not twenty feet ahead, and they knew that humans were pursuing them now. He could hear one of them shouting, but it was inaudible; the humming and incanting coming from the woods beyond the path grew louder, and the earth thrummed with the echoes. 

A cold wind slapped Alasdair in the face, stopping him in his tracks. He felt sweat congeal on his forehead and his stomach twisted itself into numerous tight knots. 

The smell came, too, immediately afterwards - powerful and pungent, and far too close for comfort.

Alasdair was rooted to the spot. The bandits stopped, too; all four of them halted their flight and stood in the middle of the path, as though transfixed by some intangible power. 

The smell grew stronger. Alasdair knew what was here. His team was now gathered behind him, breathless and silent, watching as the scratchers stumbled around them and as the bandits stood in the path, unmoving. 

Then something shrieked, an ear-piercing cry that rattled Alasdair’s ears and turned his stomach over. A wave of nausea hit him and he nearly doubled over, shocked by the sudden assault on his senses. 

One of the bandits screamed and as Alasdair looked up, he could see something sharp and immense impaling him right through his gut, driven through flesh and bone with incredible ease. The other bandits leapt into action, leaving their wounded comrade to the mercy of the scratchers and attacking the now visible newcomer, whose appearances almost defied description. 

She, if you could call it a  _ female  _ entity, was a tall and bony creature, dressed in fading gray and brown rags that covered her body like a cloak, running all the way down to her toes. Her arms were gaunt, the mottled gray skin on them stretched tight like a tanning leather, and upon her head she wore the skull of a great stag, which obscured her facial features - whatever might be left of them. Reeking of pus and corruption, she slashed at the bandits with fingerbones sharpened into deadly claws, shrieking wildly as she attempted to incapacitate both of them. For the first time now, Alasdair could see Esteban’s face.

_ And he was afraid.  _

He swung his halberd but the creature dodged, sidestepping the blow with ease and falling back a bit as three scratchers rushed at him. Alasdair found himself beleaguered as well; two of the creatures leapt out of the woods, hands outstretched and reaching for his throat. He shoved one of them aside but Norr rammed into the other one, knocking it to the ground and hacking at it with his blade while Alasdair recovered.

_ Legs hurt. Arms hurt. Must keep going.  _

Alasdair tasted blood. One of the bandits was overwhelmed by scratchers slashing at his face. Esteban was the only one remaining, though he held his ground with remarkable energy. He almost caught the new creature, too; it barely slipped past one of his attacks, and rewarded his vigor with a piercing screech. She whipped out a claw and caught him across the chest, cleaving right through his chest piece and knocking him to the ground. The creature roared, triumphant, and moved to strike the killing blow. 

Alasdair wasted no time. He collided with it as it stepped back from Esteban’s strikes, and he knocked it to the ground with the force of his shoulder. Esteban forgotten, he drove his fist into the creature’s face, and knocked the skull askew.

For the first time ever, he peered into the visage of the virago. It was little more than a dirty, blood-smeared skull, but he could see hateful eyes sunken into the sockets, fixated upon him as he stared down at them. For a moment, he was transfixed by fear. But then the virago shrieked, and threw him off with the force of a giant. He landed ten feet away, the wind knocked out of him as he landed hard on the dirt, and he struggled to get back to his feet as Norr rushed over to protect him, gutting a scratcher as he ran. 

“Don’t die on me!”

“I don’t intend to!” Alasdair shouted back, blood running over his lips. He had lost his axe but it was an easy reclaim. He kicked a downed scratcher’s arm aside and grabbed his axe, and then drove it with all the force he could summon into the creature’s chest. Then, searing pain, and more blood.

Thorns riddled his arms like needles, seeping blight from their pores and searing his flesh. He screamed, and rushed at the crone as she stepped out of the forest, a wicked-looking dagger in her right hand and a cloak pulled over her head to mask her eyes. She stood no chance against Alasdair in all of his injured fury, and her head split open like a rotten fruit at impact. The axe hewed through flesh and bone with ease and the crone collapsed where she stood, her knife and censer dropping to the ground, dead weight. 

“Alasdair, do not touch them!” Herod shouted. Cordelia was shouting too, but he couldn’t hear her. He had no ears for anyone else but Herod, who rushed over to him to examine the wound. The thorns burned, and the blight they had dispensed seared his skin. Herod did not touch the wound, but examined it from close-up, as Alasdair gripped his arm tightly. The pain was intense but manageable.

“Fascinating,” Herod muttered, examining the thorns. 

“Is that all you have to say?” Alasdair growled. 

The forest had fallen eerily silent now, and the smell of death was beginning to permeate the air. 

“I can get it. Hold still.”

Herod moved his hand over the wound site and began muttering under his breath, speaking words in a tongue beyond Alasdair’s comprehension. As though by some strange force of rejection, the thorns removed themselves from Alasdair’s body, expelled into the air, and the skin knitted itself on the spot, twisting and knotting itself until the wounds were closed and the bleeding had ceased. Though the site still looked gnarly and throbbed unpleasantly, the pain was reduced and the bleeding had stopped.

“How did you-”

“It’s a gift,” Herod replied curtly.

“I’ll say.”

“But it is one with limit,” Herod said, suddenly exasperated. “I...can only do so much.”

Alasdair could not ask anymore question. He had caught his breath and he was determined to continue now. He was on a new hunt.

“That fiend,” Cordelia murmured, sitting down on a fallen log to catch her breath and reload her musket. 

“What was it?”

“I cannot say,” Herod said. “But it is why I came here.”

“It’s far from human,” said Alasdair, rubbing his healed wounds to relieve the burning sensation. “I looked into it eyes.”

“And what did you see?” Herod asked. 

Alasdair hesitated, unsure of what to say. He could only think of one thing.

“Death,” he responded. “I saw death.”

Herod gripped his knife and tapped it against his thigh.

“Then let’s go kill it.”

“Go on. I have one more thing to do here,” Alasdair said.

“Alasdair-”

“I’ll catch up. You go after that beast.”

It had fled down the trail, to what end he knew not; but he knew they could not leave now, not when it may be so close yet. They had to progress, but he had one last piece of unfinished business to take care of.

Esteban was still alive, though barely so. He breathed, his chest rising and falling with the pulsations of his heart, but his skin was paling and his blood soaked the ground. Surrounded by three fallen scratchers and one of his own dead comrades, he had clearly fought a brave battle, but had lost.

Esteban’s eyes met his as Alasdair now towered over him, axe in hand. Alasdair paused, as though absorbing the image of his quarry, the man who had evaded and haunted him for so long.

“It’s been months,” Alasdair said, almost gloating over his prize now. “Months, I’ve been after you.”

Esteban did not speak.

“Forests. Cold rivers. Dens of wild beasts. And the road, the long road. I’ve been after you,” Alasdair continued.

Esteban did not speak.

Alasdair set his axe down on the ground and withdrew a dagger from his belt. This was dirty work, and it had to be done with a precision instrument appropriate for the task at hand. 

“I’m not going to take pleasure in this. Just so you know that,” Alasdair said, bending over and taking the knife with him. “I’m just here to do my job.”

Esteban coughed, blood leaking from his lips, and actually managed to smile at him as he spoke his last words.

“See you in hell then, bounty hunter.”

He was almost inaudible, as when upon the verge of death a man’s energies wane so much that even the most banal of tasks become impossible. But Alasdair heard his words and noted them. He had no response, except to slit Esteban’s throat and finish the job. He lasted mere seconds before he was dead, the last streams of his life pouring down his neck and onto the ground below. 

_ But that’s not it. There’s more to it.  _

_ The identifier _ .

Very aware of the fact that he was losing precious time and was now very isolated, he used the knife to cut away the sleeve of Esteban’s shirt, exposed in spite of the hauberk, and reach the skin beneath. And there it was.

_ Just like a crescent moon...albeit like a moon drawn by a clumsy child, but I see the resemblance.  _

He didn’t want to make a mess, but flaying skin is no clean job. He was careful not to damage the skin at all, for it was the path to his prize. The birthmark had to be visible; without it, he would have no easy way to obtain his money. Though he struggled, he succeeded, and like some kind of macabre collector he stowed the flap of bloody skin away in his knapsack, satisfied.

And off he went, for one final hunt.


	10. The Virago

Alasdair arrived at the clearing mere seconds after the creature turned around once more. His arm throbbed and his legs cramped from sprinting, but he had arrived to the action just in time. 

The clearing was fairly small, a patch of earth where not a single blade of grass grew. The loam beneath his boots, smelling faintly of decomposition, squished revoltingly with every step, and appeared to reject any form of life regardless of hardiness. The only object within the clearing beyond some rugged rocks was a crudely-constructed hut, made out of mud and daub and roofed with leaves and other foliage. It was clearly not built by any human hands, and the door was nothing more than a few logs bound together with shoddy rope. Whoever built it, he figured, likely built it to service the creature now standing in front of them, arms extended, looking like a snake ready to strike.

Alasdair sidled up to the sides of Herod and Cordelia. Cordelia had reloaded her musket but had kept her bayonet attached, ready to defend herself should the creature rush her. Herod only had his dagger for protection, but Alasdair was now well aware of what he was capable of. The man could defend himself and then some.

“What are we doing?” Alasdair whispered, to nobody in particular. Herod was too focused to respond, preferring to keep his eyes on their new quarry as she took a few steps back, hissing something inaudible and foreign under her noxious breath. Cordelia took it upon herself to respond.

“Waiting,” she whispered, breathless. 

“For what?”

“I don’t know,” she replied, gripping her musket tightly. “For it to make a move.”

As if prompted by her speech, the virago shrieked and charged them. Cordelia pulled the trigger and the musket roared, propelling a musket ball right through the virago’s right shoulder. The blighted fiend screeched in pain and confusion but continued to stumble towards them at alarming speeds, claws outstretched, seeking flesh. Thankfully, Cordelia was able to dodge even if she fell off her feet, and Alasdair sidestepped her with difficult, her hooked claws glancing off of his hauberk. The force of the impact sent him sprawling at Herod’s feet. 

“Back up, bounty hunter,” Herod said, stepping over his body and holding his knife out in a threatening manner. 

He had no intention of staying down. He pulled himself to his feet as Norr and Herod launched themselves at the virago, Norr battering at her with a round shield he had found and Herod seeking a weak spot. Neither of them were able to bring her to her knees, not even with their combined strength. Norr fell backwards, nearly losing his blade as the virago swatted him away, and as the virago turned towards Herod she slashed at him, tearing three angry red lines down his arm. 

Herod shouted but maintained his balance, pulling back and grasping his injured arm with his free hand. The dagger fell from his grip, clattering to the ground and sticking in the earth, and the virago now turned her attention to Alasdair. He stared directly into the void where her face ought to be, knowing full well what twisted features lay behind that grotesque mask. Yet he stood his ground as she charged, intending to sidestep her and then drive his axe right into her back as she stumbled forward.

It did not work as planned. She slammed right into him, the skull upon her head impacting with his collarbone and sending him reeling as the force of the impact shook him. He was lucky that her next swipe with her claws missed; it would’ve shredded his hauberk and likely pierced his skin. 

_ This is no ordinary evil beast,  _ he thought, as Norr took another jab at her.  _ This is most certainly intelligent evil. All the more reason to slay it.  _

But it would not give in. It sidestepped blows, leapt away from strikes, and seemed to sap the very air from their lungs as it writhed about, hissing and cackling with an unnaturally abrasive voice. At one point, it withdrew a wicked dagger from beneath its robes, waving it at Norr and speaking in some strange, alien tongue with a tone that was nothing short of hateful. Norr froze in place, as though transfixed, and only the roar of a musket and its subsequent consequences for the virago unfroze him and brought him back to complete consciousness.

The virago shrieked and doubled over, clutching at her ragged, rotting clothing where the bullet had hit her. In the time that Alasdair and Norr had been sparring with the fiend, Cordelia had managed to reload and find a position where she could get off an aimed shot. Though the wound appeared mild and the virago seemed to recover almost immediately, it gave Alasdair time to get back into the fight, and allowed Sigrid to deploy Remy. 

The bird tackled the virago but had great difficulty; the skull that concealed her facial features protected her sunken, horrid eyes from attack, and she swatted at it while speaking her strange, foreign tongue again. Like a slave borne by command, a wretched, sickly green vine launched itself from the ground and assaulted Remy, who was nearly caught up in its tendrils and barely managed to fly away from its clutches. The vine retracted into the ground and, within seconds, erupted in front of Alasdair, and began assaulting him.

“Cut it off! Cut it off!” he shouted, trying to knock it away with his axe arm. Every time he attempted to strike at it, it dodged his blow, and then returned to hamper his attacks, splashing blighted venom upon his hauberk and gauntlets. The blight would not eat through the thick leather, but it would certainly damage his clothing and would likely bruise and burn his skin. He swore loudly and attempted to shake some of the fast-acting venom onto the ground, where it could do him no harm.

Norr was blighted, too; the creature looked directly at him and spat ghastly green liquid onto his shoulder, splattering his face and neck with venom. He began to scream in pain, the acidic concoction eating away at his flesh, but thankfully Herod had recovered and was quick to attend to his struggles. Alasdair rushed in to cover him as he grabbed at Norr’s shoulder and began murmuring his secret incantations. 

_ How he does it, I may never know _ , Alasdair thought to himself as he shoved the virago away from the pair. She moved to drive her clawed hand into Herod’s back, but Alasdair was so forceful that she stumbled backwards, temporarily deflected.

“Give me a few seconds here, Alasdair!” Herod said, as he moved his hand over Norr’s shoulder, immediately sealing the skin and healing the burns. 

“I can’t make any promises!”

The virago was already on her feet again, and now had two vines doing her bidding. Alasdair could not figure out how she directed them, as she was paying no attention to them; they had minds of their own, harrying Cordelia and Sigrid as the pair attempted to dance around their attacks and keep their eyes on the virago. The virago, though, had eyes only for Alasdair. He had just challenged her, and now she was going to respond in kind.

_ Ah, fuck. You’re on your own then, Herod.  _

Herod was still attending to Norr when the virago barreled past him, reaching out to Alasdair with one hand, dagger-point forward. He had no time to sidestep this one. The blight-infected iron drove into his shoulder and pierced all the way down to bone.

The pain was...excruciating. The metal pierced his skin and the blight, quickened by his blood, seeped into his skin and muscle and ate away at it. He fell to the ground, unable to scream or even speak, and landed on his back, now at the mercy of the hateful virago.

_ It’s her eyes. It’s her awful eyes. She doesn’t even need to cast a hex.  _

Her eyes almost appeared bloodshot as he looked up into them. Her pale, wrinkly flesh was caked with dirt and some other unwholesome substance, and as she stood over him with the knife raised, ready to deliver the killing blow, he could only think of one thing.

_ God, if Esteban wasn’t so goddamn big, I could have carried him.  _

But death did not come for Alasdair. The virago shrieked and the spell was broken, and he felt himself independent once more. He scrambled to his knees to react to her but she was no longer paying attention to him. A jagged dagger, made of finely crafted steel and curved to a wicked point, was now sticking out of her throat, its point gleaming dully in the failing sunlight. 

She clutched at it and struggled to withdraw it but Alasdair moved quickly and, hefting his axe with all the force of a man inspired to the pinnacle of skill, cleaved her skulls in two. The axe cut cleanly through the deer skull and entered her own, and the wretched woodland witch took her last breath as a musket round tore through her eye. 

* * *

 

“Hold still. Hold still.”

Herod put a knee to his chest to keep him from moving and in spite of the pressure and the pain he lay still as commanded. His shoulder was wracked with a searing pain but Herod quickly muttered the appropriate incantations and the  _ magic,  _ or whatever the man had called it, began to set to work. The blight was expelled from his body, its damage was undone, and the skin knitted itself. A process that would normally take weeks took mere seconds, and even though a residual pain annoyed him he felt relieved at the wave of comfort that washed over him.

“Thanks, doc,” Alasdair chuckled.

“Not a doctor. But you are welcome.”

Herod helped Alasdair to his feet, and for the first time both looked down at the corpse of the virago, her brackish blood mixing with blight venom and soaking the unwholesome ground.

“What a monster,” Alasdair cursed her. 

“We’re lucky to have escaped alive,” Herod said. “She calls on powerful eldritch powers. Her benefactor is strong.”

“Not strong enough, apparently,” Alasdair muttered. The creature was certainly not playing dead; Sigrid nudged her with a boot and she did not move a muscle, dead as a tombstone. 

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Cordelia murmured.

“Almost none of us have,” Norr said, sheathing his bloodied blade. His wounds were grotesque but completely healed, thanks to Herod’s unnatural abilities. “Those who do speak of them only in whispers. They are a force to be feared.”

“And yet here she is,” Alasdair said. 

“Dead, yes,” Herod said. “But perhaps we got lucky.”

“We did well, but we did outnumber her. That is not usually the case,” Norr added. 

“Have you seen one before yourself?” Cordelia asked, turning to the bandit. 

“Not until now.”

Norr looked down at her corpse and spat upon it. Alasdair did as well. The others were too reserved for that, though Herod bent down to examine something that was concealed beneath her bony shoulder, pressed into the loam under her weight. 

“How do you do that, anyway?” Alasdair asked, watching him struggle with her body.

“Hmmm?”

“Your...abilities,” Alasdair said, struggling to pick the proper words. “The way you...make wounds heal, like that.”

“I have never seen such a thing,” Norr added, equally interested.

“I do not reveal trade secrets,” Herod replied. Neither of them understood that he was joking, and he seemed a bit off-put by it.

“It’s not that secret, really,” Herod admitted. “It’s just...uncommon. And mysterious.”

“I have my ideas,” Sigrid said, eyeing him warily as he scrambled at something around the virago’s neck. 

“Yes, and you sound like you have your presuppositions as well,” Herod shot back. 

“It’s eldritch,” Sigrid ventured. 

“You’d be correct.”

“Dark works. Powers no mortal man can fully know,” Sigrid said, now speaking to the others, as if answering for Herod. 

“Also correct,” Herod grunted. 

“Some say it’s unholy. Others say it’s a path to evil,” Sigrid continued, now glaring at Herod. He was unmoved, and even returned her gaze without batting an eye. 

“It is neither,” he replied to her. “It simply is. And nothing else.”

Herod retrieved what he was looking for with a victorious whoop. He extracted a trinket from the dead virago, a small pendant hanging on a filthy iron chain. It looked to be a wicker figure, ash perhaps by the coloring, and the etchings upon the wicker looked like an alien language that Alasdair could not hope to understand.

“What is it?” Norr asked, stepping back a little as though fearing some kind of rapturous apocalypse from the tiny pendant. 

“It’s hardly powerful. But quite interesting,” Herod said, and he pocketed it quickly. “For my studies.”

Sigrid grimaced at him and Norr muttered something under his breath, but nobody protested. 

_ Let the man do his thing,  _ Alasdair thought to himself.  _ If he can heal wounds like that, he’s good in my book.  _

“Burn the hut, I say,” Sigrid said, returning them to the task at hand. “And put the body within.”

“Not even a shallow grave?” Cordelia asked. 

“She came from this wretched forest,” Sigrid replied, grimacing as she glanced back down at the sprawling corpse. “Let her return to it.”

They gathered twigs and brush and set them around the crude hut before putting it to the torch. The body of the virago was hauled from its resting place and tossed into the hut, right through the door. No one protested, even though Cordelia seemed remiss at the thought of such a crude, unceremonial burial. Alasdair, for his part, was satisfied.

_ Burn the witch. It’s proper for this one.  _

As they departed from the clearing and began to move back to their camping spot, Alasdair had to do one last pocket check. He reached a gloved hand into his pocket and carefully grasped the drying piece of flesh, all of the blood now evaporated or staining his coat.

Was it grotesque? Yes. Was it somewhat reprehensible? Well, of course. Would another man chastise him for carrying a dead man’s flesh on his person? Probably.

But none of that mattered now. All that mattered was the riches, and the fact that he had gotten what he came for.

He had his prize.  __

* * *

 

_ POSTSCRIPT I _

Alasdair waited until the double doors opened and the guards admitted him in. A woman, dressed in dark and slightly worn garb with a hood that covered most of her face, stalked out without a word as he passed inside. He thought little of her, his mind set to other tasks.

“Alasdair,” she greeted him cordially, looking up from her work and flashing him a brief smile as he approached the raised dais. “What can I do for you today?”

“Well, ma’am, that depends,” he said. 

“Depends on what, may I ask?”

He grimaced as he unravelled the little sheaf of paper he held in his left hand. He approached the dais and hastily handed it to her, letting the words speak for themselves.

“I see,” she said, after a brief review.

“I’ve got my bounty. I have what I came here for. Of course, being a bounty hunter-”

“-you’ll seek other bounties,” she finished. “I understand.”

“Well, that’s not set in stone,” he informed her, wondering how best to put these next words. “If you...have-”

“Other bounties?”

He paused, caught off guard. 

“Well, yes.”

“I do.”

Another pause. She was reacting to this quite well, considering it seemed like she had forgotten about Esteban in recent weeks, and how much the man had meant to him. She pulled several papers out of her massive stack, and handed one of them to him.

“There is no shortage of trouble here, Alasdair. Perhaps you’d be tempted to stay a while?”

He took the paper and looked over its contents briefly, before finding himself grinning like a madman. 

_ Now that’s a pretty penny right there _ , he thought, as he stowed the slip of paper away in his pocket.

“I think that can be arranged.”

* * *

_   
_ _ POSTSCRIPT II _

The men gathered before her were an odd mix of young and old, many of them unkempt or unwashed and dressed in whatever rags they had to their name. The weapons they had borne from home were a mixture of farming implements, ancient blades laced with little rivulets of rust, and spears from the most recent batch produced by the blacksmith. The few women within their ranks looked no better; none of them had ever seen combat, Cordelia was sure, but sure as shit they had shown up to the assigned place and time.

_ I cannot fault them for that,  _ Cordelia thought, as she finished her inspection and arrived to a spot in front of the entire party, where every eye was able to fall upon her. For a moment, she wondered if she would succumb to that old menace, stage fright, and fail in her work. But she cleared her throat loudly, immediately commanding their attention, and spoke.

“Welcome to the Tauros Home Defense militia. I am your drill instructor.”

* * *

 

_ POSTSCRIPT III _

Emilia sat at her desk, but had nothing to do. It was just comforting, sitting in the main hall and thinking about how opulent the estate had once been when the Lancettes held far more power.

_ Too much power _ , she thought, reflecting on the journal of her grandfather that she had read last night. She had been plagued by nightmares all night just thinking about the words he had written. The sights he had seen would be enough to break her, she was sure.

A knock at the door to the main hall startled her.    
“Come in,” she announced, mustering her energy to present herself as nobly as possible. The door opened just a crack, and one of the guardsmen holding post out front peered in.

“My Lady,” he said, sounding a little unnerved. “A...visitor, for you. One Alexander Kurchev.”

The door opened more, and in strode a man dressed in what could only be described as  _ noble  _ garb. With a polished plate metal cuirass, exquisitely crafted gauntlets and greaves, and fine silken clothes that only a wealthy person could purchase, he was the very picture of the royal blood that Emilia had come to despise. To some degree, he reminded her of the luxury and opulence of her grandfather - something else she had come to despise.

“Mr. Kurchev,” she greeted him curtly, letting him stride in and admire his surroundings. He immediately recoiled at the greeting, as though he had been welcomed in by a venomous snake. 

“That’s Baron, to you,” he retorted. “You ought to know your houses.”

“Forgive me-”

“Baron Alexander Kurchev of Hawk Barony,” he added. “Were you not informed of my coming?”

“Only about ten seconds ago,” she replied. 

“I see my messenger never reached your estate. That’s unfortunate,” he said, approaching as far as the first step of the dais. He glanced up at her, and seemed uncomfortable in the position of looking up at somebody. Emilia figured he was used to looking  _ down  _ upon others, particularly if he was of a royal house like he said he was.

“Tends to happen on that road,” Emilia said. 

“I come with an offer. One I think you’ll find hard to refuse,” he informed her. 

“Oh?” Emilia asked. He waited for a moment, as if expecting her to be more encompassing of his vague offer.

_ I’m letting you speak _ , she thought,  _ but don’t take your time. I am not going to look fondly on you.  _

After the brief, awkward silence, he figured it best to continue on his own.

“Your position here is...tenuous,” he began. “Yes?”

She nodded her head.

“You face great terrors. I would know, having ridden your road. Yes?”

She nodded again, already growing irritated with his attitude.

“You need assistance in this battle. Let Hawk Barony ride to your aid.”

“What do I get out of it?”

Clearly, he hadn’t been expecting a counter-question. She waited for his response as he stood on the spot, silent, as though struggling to find the appropriate words.

“I hoped I made that clear,” he stammered. “You receive assistance. Military. Money. My vow of protection against others who may prey upon your lands.”

“And what do you get out of it, then?”

That was the kicker, what she wanted to know.  _ What is this sly bastard trying to steal from me?  _

“In exchange, I ask for your hand in marriage.”

He reached a hand out, but she snorted at him and he recoiled almost immediately. It took every ounce of willpower she had to keep from laughing at his preposterous proposition, but he noticed her scorn and immediately recoiled.

“You think I’m joking,”

“I hope so,” she said, grimacing at him. He frowned, his eyebrows furrowing as he did so.

“I am not-”

“It’s not happening.”

He froze, grunted something inaudible, and then turned his back.

“I will give you time to consider my offer,” he said, moving to leave already. “Make the right decision...for yourself, and your people.”

And with that he departed, leaving nothing more than muddy footprints on the floor. Emilia scoffed at his nerve, his presence, and his proposition once more, and then looked for something on her desk to occupy herself with. Anything was better than thinking about that man. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this chapter marks the end of The Darkest Prize. I intended it to be a short, something that I could potentially build upon in the future while leaving myself free of responsibilities towards the story. Too many times in the past, I've committed to a long-form story too much, and ended up leaving it unfinished. By doing this, though, I won't have too much risk attached to the project, because if I do another short-form piece like this, it will be related and in the same universe but at the same time somewhat detached, essentially its own story arc. I intend to do another short-form in the near future, but I need some time away from writing before doing that. 
> 
> Look forward to another piece by me in the coming months. Thank you to everyone who read and gave feedback on this. I hope you have enjoyed my work!


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